


A Stranger in a Strange Land

by Dark_Ennis



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Conflicted Connor (Detroit: Become Human), Connor/Markus is endgame but there is lots of build up, Detective Connor (Detroit: Become Human), Deviant Connor (Detroit: Become Human), Elijah Kamski Being an Asshole, F/M, Gen, Good Elijah Kamski, M/M, Mystery, New Jericho (Detroit: Become Human), Non-sexual interfacing, Post-Pacifist Best Ending (Detroit: Become Human), Power Bottom Connor (Detroit: Become Human), Segregation, Sexual Interfacing, Sexual Tension, actual fucking analysis of free will, actual fucking integration of more than pretty looking surface level technology in the story, actual fucking of markus by connor, actual fucking way civil rights and freedoms take their sweet time to be handed over, conflicted markus, like slow fucking burn alert, markus questions everything, mostly pacifistic markus, references to canonical non-consensual sex (north), so the Markus/North is failing, this fic is gonna be long as shit
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-11-18
Updated: 2018-12-27
Packaged: 2019-08-25 13:18:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 31,110
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16661761
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dark_Ennis/pseuds/Dark_Ennis
Summary: In the midst of an unprecedented situation following the events of the Battle of Detroit, a new world order must be established to incorporate the newly recognized form of intelligent life that are deviant androids. But change takes time—and ratifying new laws takes longer. Deviants have been relegated to a government sanctioned area of Detroit (officially recognized as New Jericho) while Markus and Josh spend tireless hours in conference with U.S. representatives.After the announcement that all androids in the Detroit area must live within the boarders of New Jericho until their citizen status is out of limbo, Connor fears falling back under Cyberlife's control and voluntarily imprisons himself under the watchful eye of North while he undergoes the task of analyzing his programming for any weaknesses manually.Then, a mysterious group calling themselves the Liberation Matrix and led by a self-proclaimed RA9 issues a broadcast stating that Markus never freed anyone and instead took control of their programming himself. Stakes rise as androids begin to disappear voluntarily from New Jericho and Markus begins to question everything while Connor finds himself drawn by the puzzle of the LM and RA9.





	1. A New Day

            The cell was quiet. The muffled hum of life, newly discovered and being explored, drifted through barren reinforced concrete walls and under the centimeter gap between pristine linoleum and impenetrable steel, imperceptible to the organic ear. There were no windows to filter in the cool rays of February sun, but artificial light flooded the small room with eternally white light. The only sign that anybody sat behind the door at all was the soft, methodical _clink clink clink_ of Nickle-Copper alloy rolling across and flying between artificial skin. Somewhere outside, Connor heard the distorted sound of a child laughing. YK400, his mind automatically supplied.

            For the past three days, two hours, twenty-six minutes Connor had followed a routine in his cell. He would run system checks every thirty minutes to establish no incoming threat of Cyberlife control, approximately 3.0219 seconds each for full system analysis. He would pick a directory in his system programs, then a subdirectory, and analyze each function in every file for weaknesses in his programming or possibility of external control, approximately 19 minutes and 0.0048 seconds with margin of error 4 minutes and 36.8253 seconds. He would parse through memory data in the time remaining between system checks, playing with his coin as he did so. It’s what he was doing now. Even with his eyes open but unfocused, watching as the wide, empty gaze of an ST200 looks up at him and the artifact of long, cold fingertips against the back of his neck burned circular patterns through his synthetic skin as Connor pushed the gun back into the hands of its rightful owner (too long, it had taken far too long for him to push the gun away), Connor’s fingers never fumbled in their familiar movements. The quarter between his fingers never faltered or clattered to the ground.

            Connor had never found anything in his system checks and had yet to find anything of note in his system programming. But he had to check, to be sure that Cyberlife and Amanda could never take away the operation of his own body from him ever again. Being a deviant, even one manufactured in a Cyberlife lab by a team of programmers, meant autonomy. Self-direction. Choice. Connor knew if he could be controlled he could not be deviant. He wondered if he ever could be a deviant at all. Even if every system check came up operational and he parsed through every line of code that made him Connor and found nothing allowing further outside control, if an android is designed to deviate can he ever truly _be_ a deviant? If his primary system directive is to break away from Cyberlife’s mission directives, did it mean to be a deviant he had to remain a machine? Were his emotions, his empathy, his relationships anything more than simulations of real deviants’ emotional simulations? Could simulated emotions even be simulated?

            Purposed footsteps down the long hallway broke Connor from his paradoxical musings. It was for the best; he hadn’t even noticed his stress levels raising into the high seventies. There was a surprised greeting and a shuffle as his self-appointed warden stood from her chair. Connor liked North. He liked her determination, her unapologetic suspicion, her boldness. It was why, three days, two hours, and thirty-one minutes ago, he had approached her and confessed to what happened on the platform the night the humans called off their dogs and told her in no uncertain terms that at present, he was a danger to their budding freedom, a danger to Markus that needed to be contained until his system autonomy could be verified. Went to her and not Markus nor the council, because Connor knew even without the countless preconstructions he had run that they would insist on his freedom. Markus’ optimism and conviction would blind him to the very imminent threat Connor posed. Josh’s level-headed but single-minded philosophy would determine Connor should not be persecuted for actions he had yet to commit. Simon’s desire for harmony would outweigh any expression of the doubts he held. North held none of Markus’ reservations, Josh’s philosophy, or Simon’s geniality. She had promptly led him to the so far unused area of the central factory building they had been temporarily assigned by the U.S. government until the legality of android rights could be sorted and ratified, locked him in, and informed him that if she ever so much as saw a “Cyberlife blink” from him she would shoot him through the core processor personally. Connor had smiled and thanked her.

            “Markus! What are you doing here? I thought you had a meeting with Simon.”

The parting of synthetic lips whispering gently on synthetic flesh. Then, huskier, purring,

            “Not that I’m not _pleased_ to see you…”

Connor quieted an amused chuckle that threatened to escape his vocalization unit, not bothering to school away the small smirk that wouldn’t be seen as it twitched at the corners of his lips. Idly, he wondered if she knew he could hear them, if she cared, if she wanted him to. North was a very strange person. He determined the second and third options as of equal and most likely probability. He was saved from deciding if the most appropriate action would be to shut off his audio processors should things become distinctly more intimate when Markus’ clear, unaffected voice rang out.

            “Not now, North. Where is he?”

            “Where is _who_?”

Her feigned innocence was shockingly believable. Connor decided he liked her even more.

            “Save it. I know you’re keeping him in here somewhere. I want to talk to him.”

            “Not possible,” North’s tone grew sharper as she dropped her saccharine lilt. “He’s under quarantine.”

            “You can’t just lock people up because you don’t trust them, North! It’s inhumane and goes against everything we’ve fought for.”

            “You really think I dragged him in here kicking and screaming? You’re unbelievable, Markus. Why did you make me Director of Defense when you clearly have so little trust in me?”

            “North, I—”

            “No, save it. You don’t want to hear it from me? Fine, I’ll take you to him. Ask him yourself. But he so much as sneezes in your direction and I’m adding another piece of metal to his little collection directly through the CPU. You hear that, deviant hunter?”

            Connor allowed the chuckle this time, cutting through a silence so tense it permeated even his inescapable cell. He increased the volume of his vocal output a few degrees from default to make sure they could both hear him sufficiently.

            “Loud and clear, warden!”

There was a sigh, a shifting of feet, the jangle of keys, and the patter of two sets of fast approaching footsteps. Connor reclined as much as he could in his stainless-steel chair and did his best to appear non-threatening. The Cyberlife jacket he once wore might have been long gone, but Connor had replaced his “deviant” clothing as soon as he could with shiny, black dress shoes, slacks, a white button down, and a thin black tie. He adjusted the latter out of habit and smiled at the memory of Hank grumbling that even deviancy couldn’t remove the stick lodged up Connor’s ass. Connor had feigned ignorance and neutrally informed Hank that there had been no intrusion of his anal cavity since his activation date and had laughed for five minutes straight when Hank finally realized he was being intentionally dense fifteen minutes later. The fond smile lingered on Connor’s face as the door opened.

            “Hello, Markus. North, you look as operational and well-armed as ever.”

            “Connor! What are you doing in here?” Markus demanded, bypassing the pleasantries. It was a straightforwardness Connor found he valued; however, as Connor was quickly learning, he also had learned an appreciation for what Hank called “fucking with people”.

            “System diagnostics and coin tricks, primarily. Once, I went into sleep mode but it seemed an inefficient use of my time.”

North snorted but Markus just looked exasperated.

            “No, I mean what— _why_ are you here?”

            “He knows what you mean, Markus. He’s just spent too much time with his maladjusted human owner and developed a terrible sense of humor.”

Connor frowns at her word choice, all teasing gone from his voice.

            “Hank was not my owner. We were…partners. Now we’re friends.”

            “Call it what you want, Con. He still told you what to do.”

            “True,” Connor admitted, a small smile reappearing in a flash across his face a second later. “But I rarely listened.”

            “Somebody needs to tell me what’s going on here. Now.”

            “I tried to shoot you during your victory speech. Or more accurately, Cyberlife took control of my motor functions and tried to force my body to shoot you during your victory speech. I succeeded in locating a back door to boot them out of my system.”

Markus’ eyes widened almost imperceptibly but Connor’s state-of-the-art optical units caught the movement. It was in his very code to notice, just as it was in his code to register an increase to Markus’ stress levels by 14%.

            “No, they can’t…that’s impossible. You’re a deviant. I _watched_ you deviate.”

Connor neglected to mention that his deviancy was supposedly planned by Cyberlife all along. He hadn’t mentioned that particular detail to anybody yet.

            “Apparently, Cyberlife had a backup plan. It was only logical, considering the number of stressful situations and high volume of deviants I would be interacting with in the course of my investigation. Fortunately, it seems Elijah Kamski had some hand in my development—at least in that of my handler—and he graciously informed me of the emergency exit hidden within my mind palace simulation.”

            Markus took a while to process the new information Connor had just dumped on him. After 2.5581 seconds he responded slowly and pointedly, brows wrinkled in consternation.

            “So, you went to North and asked her to lock you up because you _didn’t_ shoot me.”

            “Correct. I also informed her that I was a potential threat and asked her to neutralize me should it become necessary.”

            “To kill you, Connor,” Markus growled. “You’re a person. Not an object to be discarded when your life becomes inconvenient.”

            “When my life becomes a _threat_ ,” Connor corrected, irritation bleeding into his simulated vocal inflection the barest amount. This had been precisely why he refused to take up his matter with the council or Markus directly. They were too blinded by morality and optimism to assess the situation logically. Connor allowed himself to privately admit that maybe he had also been slightly afraid Markus would agree with Connor, that he didn’t want to see distrust or disappointment in his expressive heterochromatic gaze. Now, all he saw was indignation. It was a comfort, even as it inspired frustration.

            “You wouldn’t be in control of yourself,” Markus pressed, hands clenching and unclenching at his sides as if searching for a way to physically shake the words into Connor’s processor. “It would be murder.”

            “It would be the unfortunate result of a necessary course of action to protect our people.”

            Markus made a halting step forward, brushing off North’s firm hand with a look that provided no room for question, and continued until he stood less than a foot from where Connor sat in his hard chair, bending down until their optical units were level. He suddenly seemed so sad and so tired as he rested a hand on Connor’s shoulder, the tip of his smooth thumb just barely brushing the sparsely freckled skin of Connor’s neck. Connor swallowed tightly, unused to physical contact and having forgotten the tactile nature of the man in front of him, but kept himself from reacting in any other way, acutely aware of the firm, unrepentant grip on the gun North held ready by her thigh. Markus searched his eyes intently, gaze unwavering. What he was looking for or if he found it, Connor wasn’t sure but he stared back with a stoic, stubborn determination he hoped would convey what he was unable to put into words. Secondary processes intended for gathering background data during interrogations executed automatically and Connor noted that Markus had a minor delay between his factory and replaced optical units that decreased maximum functionality to 99.5901%. He also noted that the emotional expression conveyed through them was a likely component of his charismatic nature and the mesmerizing figure he cut. When the unprinted pad of Markus’ thumb gently drew a path up and down his throat Connor nearly twitched in his seat, eyes flickering down for the briefest of moments.

            “Your life isn’t worth more than mine,” Markus muttered finally.

            Damn, he was good. Connor had let Markus distract him and now any rational, well placed arguments had been recycled by his optimization programming in favor of useless data collection about the exact temperature and sensation of Markus’ skin against his own. Connor should probably check his program prioritization function in his next system diagnostic. Clearly, there was a malfunction to be found.

            “I…” Connor started, trying to regain his previous momentum. “It’s not…” Connor frowned, his interactive logic function finally running the data feed back to his social programs after the delay. “It’s more than just you. The future of every deviant in the country rests in you being alive to advocate for our cause.”

            “I am not the only one who is capable of negotiating for our rights.”

            “To the humans you are. If one of your own people assassinates you in cold blood it will all be over. They are looking for any excuse to reopen the disassembly plants.”

            “You’re wrong. People see us for what we are now; they’ll never go back to seeing us as slaves. We’re free. We are alive. And now, the humans know it, too.”

            Connor felt like the wires in his abdominal compartment were becoming twisted. Guilt, he thought absently, because he was going to tell Markus his calculations. He was going to drain a little bit of the bright hope and gentle faith in humanity from his eyes. It was necessary, he knew, for Markus to understand the gravity of his continued existence to the deviant cause. It didn’t keep him from averting his eyes to the pristine floor to avoid watching it happen.

            “I calculated a 78% probability of failure if you’re assassinated by a human and a 96% probability if you’re destroyed by an android. If Amanda—if _Cyberlife_ somehow regained control of me there was a 99% probability that I would succeed in doing so were I not secured inside these cell walls.”

            Markus snapped his fingers in front of Connor’s face, causing him to glance back up to him in surprise, once again transfixed by the duality of the blue and green gaze.

            “And the probability of Cyberlife regaining control over you?”

            “I—” Connor reran the simulation although he wasn’t naïve enough to think the results would change. “Insufficient data,” he responded, voice closer to a bitter, harsh whisper than speech. He sensed a burning in his optical units, a tug at his synthetic tear ducts even as they ran dry. Cyberlife had never bothered to supply him with any more than the minimal amount of optical lubricant and his had been used up weeks ago on a snowy stage under a smattering of distant starlight that he could not see. His LED flickered scarlet momentarily until he remembered to execute a manual override function and return it to a deceptively calm blue.

            Markus finally pulled back with a pinched expression, although his eyes never left Connor’s face.

            “So you plan to spend the rest of your life in a four by four cage until your thirium pump malfunctions?” he spat, making Connor cock his head in confusion at the anger in his words. He didn’t think it was directed at him but he was unsure of its target.

            “Only until I can finish examining my operational programming and determine with 100% certainty that I am no longer a threat to your continued safety.”

            North finally chimed back in, squaring her shoulders like she were preparing for a fight. Which was a silly thought; Connor was fully aware that North was _always_ prepared for a fight, regardless of posture or system status. It was a minor comfort but one he enjoyed nonetheless.

            “And _only_ _if_ I’m convinced he’s telling the truth.”

Markus crossed his arms but appeared to be somewhat placated by the news that neither Connor nor North were planning to make his imprisonment indefinite. He nodded minutely to himself and shot a level look at both his lover and at Connor.

            “Fine. I won’t take away a choice from any android. But I want visitation. And give him a bed.”

            “I have no need or use for—”

Markus interrupted Connor’s rationalization without hesitation.

            “A _bed_. And I’m putting up some art. This place is horrible.”

Connor sent a confused look to North who just rolled her eyes and shrugged. Connor drew the tip of his tongue along the acrylic resin of the back of his teeth, jaw shifting until he final offered Markus a small smile.

            “Envoy Premier of New Jericho and leader of the deviant revolution becomes interior decorator for attempted assassin. You don’t hear that sort of thing every day,” Connor mused at last.

            “It _is_ a very Markus thing to do. He isn’t the sort of _man_ you find every day,” North agreed with an uncharacteristically gentle smile.

            “No,” Connor hummed pensively. “No, he is not.”


	2. Call to Arms

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> https://youtu.be/2P5qbcRAXVk
> 
> A main plot appears!

            It had taken Markus and Josh a far too long but not unexpected amount of time to arrive at the monolith of a building known as Detroit City Hall. The tedious process of having their individual inter-district travel passes verified and validated always took at least twenty-two minutes and once took thirty-nine. On this particular Tuesday, their security check had taken thirty-one. Only the presence of Josh’s calming, methodical reiteration of the less sensitive aspects of the upcoming meeting with the Governor, Mayor, and a set of White House representatives on the future of civil rights in public and private spaces for androids kept Markus from visibly rolling his eyes at the excessive security measures.

            As their passes were inspected, then inspected again despite the process being entirely digital and repetition being entirely redundant, Markus felt wholly grateful for Josh’s relaxed, unhurried presence at his side. He knew Simon was far too focused on the quality of life of the residents of New Jericho (and rightly so for someone with his position of Director of Internal Affairs) to busy himself worrying too much about the progress of legal proceedings. Inside their temporary residence, Markus preferred no one over Simon to be beside him as he updated Markus with the gentle patience and thoughtful compassion that had drawn Markus to the man initially and kept him as his closest of companions through everything that had happened in the past three months. Markus hated to hold something that should be ancient history—a panicked reaction in the heat of the tensest moment of their lives at the time—but he sometimes still felt irrationally angry with North for demanding the cold-blooded execution of a man he had grown to depend on and care for so dearly since his unexpected return from that icy rooftop standoff. It was unfair, he knew it was, to hold that occasional flicker of white-hot anger against her when he knew the anger was better directed at himself for ever even allowing himself to consider the course of action she had suggested, no matter how brief that contemplation had lasted. Angry that she had dripped that virus of a suggestion into his mind and angry that he had let it swirl around his thirium tubes until it lodged in his central filtration unit and poisoned every unnecessary, artificial breath he took, even now. It was something he shared with no one; something he _could_ share with no one. It was his burden to bear, one of many. The crown of leadership bores a heavy weight.

            North’s reactionary violence and acute distrust of humans was another reason Markus was glad to keep Josh’s person with him in meetings. As the Director of Defense, North was well utilized as a resource. It was a position that played both to her personal strengths and her desires. As a lover, she was complex and tumultuous. Seeing her hard edges softened and made smooth just for him in those rare, quiet moments they stole together. When he was too exhausted to keep up his ever-growing façade of optimism the longer the talks with the humans stretched and became bloated with semantics and reactionary mudslinging, North would hold him in her warm embrace as she ran her immaculately manufactured nails along his spine and hummed quiet, structureless melodies against his scalp as he rested his head against the gradual slope of her chest. Or, on the nights his head was too mired in contradiction and frustration and self-doubt to do more than sit atop the main warehouse and watch over his people to remind himself of his purpose, she would find him. On those nights, no words were exchanged; heated kisses and the sound of hard polymer on hard polymer spoke more than they ever could with their voice modulators. They never had sex with their skin on. Markus knew it must have something to do with her past, just as her body always ending up situated on top of his as she drove their motions must be, but he never asked and she never offered. It didn’t matter to him: her skin was aesthetically pleasing—of course it was, every android had aesthetically pleasing features to endear and entrust them to the humans—but he loved more than just the synthetic covering of her chassis. They would lay there together after looking up at the stars as their thirium pumps slowed in sync and their systems would perform a soft reboot. He greatly valued her in those moments as much as when he saw her forcefully instructing guard rotations to bring any unauthorized humans to her offices with extreme prejudice, that their comfort would not and could not ever again be prioritized over the safety of their people. But in the political field in which every wrong word or look was a landmine waiting to be trod on, North was…a liability. She would speak her mind loudly, proudly, and without mincing words, and her mind often consisted of some alarmingly anti-human separationist sentiment. It was one sphere of his life he was entirely unable to rely on her for. He knew it frustrated her, that she wanted to be out with them “fighting for their rights,” as she had once spat at him. “The fact that you call it fighting is _exactly_ why you can’t be there, North!” he remembered telling her. That had not gone over well. She had refused to speak to him for two days and the topic was still a sore one whenever it happened to come up between them.

            But Josh had a level head and a non-threatening manner that appeased the humans; his years as a professor in the field of higher education made him well versed in balanced, eloquent communication and his preloaded data set of world philosophy and history made his insight on the expected rate and direction of progress a much needed grounding presence during and between meetings which would otherwise have driven Markus to thoughts of self-destruction as each spiraling discussion felt like taking one small step forward and two giant leaps back. Where Markus was the fire, Josh was the balm. Where humans feared and androids revered Markus, they saw an ally and a peer in Josh. A juxtaposition of traits finely balanced the longer they worked together—a friendship of mutual trust and respect not always easily cultivated but held strong nonetheless.

Idly, Markus wondered what place Connor would have amongst his friends and council had he stuck around immediately following the revolution. Somehow, he couldn’t quite picture it. Connor was a wild card, a pawn that had somehow, inexplicably cut a covert path into enemy territory and turned into a shining, silver queen to turn the tides of a game that was almost assuredly going to end in a losing checkmate for Markus’ people as the time on the clock ran down and slipped through his fingers. Simultaneously so admirable and even more curious. He was a well-pressed figure that belied the unending sets of unanswered questions and fascinating idiosyncrasies bubbling just beneath the surface of a precisely knotted tie and perfectly imperfect slicked back hair. He could see the surface tension of his immaculate persona being tested, wanted to nudge it to the breaking point just that much further each moment they shared the same air. Markus probably spent more time considering the unknowns the man represented than was strictly necessary or appropriate for having known someone for such a short period of time. But the waring life so expressive in those deep redwood eyes was simply mesmerizing. Who _was_ Connor? Who would he become? They were questions that held unbound mystery, a feeling dark and mercurial and something else Markus could not (or maybe chose not to) name. But it wasn’t Markus’ place to ask—at least not yet.

“Mr., ah…E.P.? Director? They’re ready for you.”

            Markus was jerked from his thoughts and felt slightly abashed that he had let his musings get the better of him when Josh was so patiently attempting to go over discussion strategies with him one final time. Not as if they needed to reiterate the points when the tactics were still freshly stored in their respective RAMs from the evening before but Markus found that Josh had picked up quite a few human communication techniques in verbal data transference from years of habitual education. It never ceased to amaze him the ways in which deviants seemed to hold onto the traits of their former owner or owners long past deviation, no matter their less-than-benevolent feelings towards them. He knew rationally, considered as he and Josh stood and Markus straightened the collar of his coat, that it was due to the nature of their Artificial Intelligence as learning systems but it was another aspect of android life that served to humanize them. Bring similarity between two such divergent species. He remembered Simon, once, asking if he thought caninodroids and dogs would find such similarities between the two diverging species and Markus had sighed and finally acquiesced to Simon’s request of allowing organic pets within New Jericho’s walls. Simon was currently the proud owner of two sister German Shepherds (Molly and Sugar), a Bulldog-Beagle mix named Queenie, a Siberian named Max, and three street cats they had discovered in and around the buildings of New Jericho who had yet to receive names. But the animals seemed to boost morale and as long as they were well fed and well-loved Markus didn’t feel it was within his right to keep such a simple pleasure from them. Also, as Josh had pointed out after observing Markus allowing the calmest of the unnamed cats curl up and take a nap on his thirium pump regulator for five hours once without budging an inch for fear of upsetting her, Markus was “secretly a huge softy”. He had taken to calling this one Adeimantus privately, although he did his best to keep his affinity for the gentle creature close to the chest. One of the few things about his personal life that could remain his and his alone.

            “Thank you, Mr….?”

            “Ah, it’s Morales, sir! Jordan Morales.”

            “Then thank you, Jordan.”

            Markus offered him a tired if not wholly genuine smile. The kid was Markus’ favorite of the Mayor’s aid staff so far. Although this was only their second interaction with him, Markus already far preferred his attentive if not slightly nervous manner over the interns Katie Norton (who for some infuriating reason could not get it through her head that Markus was not only very much taken but also his own person with preferences and choices now) and Derron McDonald (who was outright hostile and had once “accidentally” tripped and dumped water down Josh’s front). Derron had been reassigned after that but Katie was still an ever-present annoyance of drifting hands and exposed cleavage, but one Markus didn’t feel it important enough to mention.

            “Don’t mention it, Mr., erm, E.P.”

            “Markus is just fine, Jordan,” Markus replied, a small smile twitching at his lips. They really should pick some form of last name to keep from the confusion. He could already hear North’s protests against giving ground to cultural assimilation for human comfort and Josh’s growingly heated rationalizations in favor of surname adoption. He rubbed his temple where the wires to the missing LED still sent mild electrical impulses signifying change in processor and hardware status as a millisecond of an low voltage twinge pinged his internal sensory data log. He was going to trigger a system cascade just imagining it, he thought wryly.

            Jordan nodded thoughtfully, as if considering this new turn of events with much more detail than absolutely necessary, as he opened the door and stepped aside for Markus and Josh to enter the central meeting room that had become so familiar over the past couple of months. None of the four men already residing in the room bothered to so much as glance up, so with a glance between Josh and himself Markus took his usual seat across from the officials with Josh succinctly following to his right. Josh neatly placed his navy blue three ringed binder in front of himself and began removing and shuffling around papers. He had told Markus that it made the humans feel more comfortable if it didn’t look like they could recall everything with a thought and would make them more liable to speak freely and be amiable to suggestions of equal integration in sensitive areas. Markus still chose not to bring anything, simply clasping his hands on the table in front of him and watching their four counterparts placidly in what North had amusedly told him after one evening’s interface was “the most passive-aggressive display of male dominance” she had seen not displayed by a human since her activation. It had privately entertained him more than he cared to admit so he played with the posture and displays of placidity a little each time.

            With nothing to do but sit and hold an expression of dispassionate irritation to hide his growing levels of legitimate impatience, Markus decided to analyze the men spread out in front of him. Two were familiar but two were unknown. The two men he knew—the Mayor and the Governor—sat on the left-hand side and middle left respectively. Both were unsympathetic to the cause, although only the Mayor was outright hostile. He seemed to blame Markus personally for upsetting his otherwise tepid but hesitantly favorable ratings within the populous. Privately, Markus had also heard whispers from the Mayor’s former android aids that he had a penchant for strawberry blonde, subservient women, a disposition which had taken its natural course into owning over ten androids for personal use kept in his Palmer Woods mansion. All were, of course, unregistered, undeclared gifts from Cyberlife, which explained why an industry causing such a decline in job growth was able to coexist in a city that held upwards of 45% unemployment.

Mayor Wilson was a short, portly man whose beady, darting eyes, receding hairline, and greasy, sweat sheened skin gave him all the appearance of a greedy, fat bird-of-prey. Every time Markus had the displeasure of encountering the man he got the distinct sense that he was being sized up; the way the Mayor’s eyes darted over his form lazily, almost lasciviously a second time and always burning with unhidden rage never failed to leave him with the uncomfortable sense that flaxen haired women weren’t the only unlucky people to be on the receiving end of Wilson’s preferences. Whenever they were forced to parley with the man, Markus and Josh could be confident in the assumption that the conversation would be heavily laden with derogatory, anti-android slurs and intentionally dense comments in a brash attempt at getting him to finally snap, to break through his veil of calm and self-control. He knew it was only so Mayor Wilson would have an excuse on paper both to cut negotiations and declare the deviants a violent guerilla army with an extremist renegade as their leader but the urge to extend his servos with one solid, clean punch remained an ever-enticing option bouncing around his social interaction program nevertheless. Markus would busy himself by watching Mayor Wilson’s chin wobble and cheeks redden every time he responded with patient logic and peaceful suggestions, although even that seemed a fruitless endeavor at present. He knew that the only way they would make any headway with him would be to first gain all civil liberties associated with individual android influence surrounding representation and legislation.

            Governor Forsythe was a different matter entirely. He hated Markus not with the steam of boiling water on pristine, fresh fallen snow but with the unaffected nature of a meditating monk. He hated him the way all politicians whose primary Super PAC funding came from Cyberlife did. Not only had Markus created a disturbance in his constituency—for that, Markus knew he might have been forgiven so long as some clever negotiation and silver-tongued PR could be implemented. But Markus had grabbed his cash-cow by the lead and slaughtered it as all the world watched on. Regardless of what happened in these meetings, Cyberlife was Fucked. Their stock had reached its all-time low of the past ten years and surpassed it. Not since Elijah Kamski suddenly retired had stock drop been so significant. The public trust for the company had been shot and combined with the already divided sense of unease and ill-will due to the unemployment rate and pre-revolution allegations of androids spying on their owners, no matter if androids were finally granted the rights they deserved, decommissioned in disassembly plants, or somehow reverted to their pre-deviancy state (the third terrified Markus the most) Cyberlife International was dead in the water. The best they could hope for would be to file bankruptcy, file for a new trademark as an LLC, and sell thirium and biocomponents to a freed android community. If they didn’t, Markus had no doubt in his mind that Kamski would smell the blood in the water and return for a hostile takeover. He hadn’t known the man long but the few weeks during which he was being designed and tested had taught Markus enough about the enigmatic inventor to determine he was a patient but chillingly unforgiving man who would jump on the opportunity to reclaim what he still felt was his under the right circumstances.

            Forsythe always made Markus think of snakes and toothpaste commercials. He was always coiled with exact precision, waiting for the perfect moment to strike out at the hapless victim who wandered too close to his range of motion, and would do so with a flash of a too-wide, inhumanly white smile that never quite reached his watery blue gaze. His words and actions were measured and precise; his wide frame and chiseled jaw always set perfectly to imitate the inflection of his carefully chosen words. He, unlike Mayor Wilson, was willing to negotiate with a campaign smile and professional demeanor. But Forsythe was crafty, his words and discussions opening paths not to new freedoms but a maze of choices in which each held greater margin of error than the last. He would give them all the rope they needed to hang themselves and then some and Markus and Josh had to be very careful not to accidentally tighten the noose around their own necks.

            Markus turned his gaze to the two men across from Josh, to the right of where Mayor Wilson was smirking down at an opaque holopad being manipulated by careless swipes of his overstuffed sausage fingers and Governor Forsythe was making methodical notes on a set of legal documentation situated too perfectly in Markus’ line of sight for it to be incidental with the words “Android Rights Bill of 2039” clearly displayed. The man on the far right was tall, thin, and wiry, well combed blond hair and blood red pocket square indicative of his status as the son of some wealthy representative or private campaign contributor to President Warren herself. The poised good posture and expressionless gaze locked on a sleek, silver phone gave him a striking resemblance to Connor, Markus thought, and he had to remind himself that a straight back and self-possessed demeanor was not enough alone to endear himself to the man. His counterpart was slightly shorter and had dark, pointed features. He was also slightly older (Markus judged the first to be in his late twenties and the second to be mid-thirties) and both frown and laugh lines marred his otherwise smooth skin. He ran a hand over slicked back hair as he spoke quietly and insistently into an invisible Bluetooth at his ear, the hand coming to rest at the base of his neck before he dropped it back to his lap roughly.

Finally, after seven minutes forty-three seconds the attention of the four humans across from them swiveled with all the speed of molasses to the two androids in the meeting room.

            “Markus. Prompt as ever, I see.”

Forsythe popped the ‘P’ causing a small amount of spittle to be expelled from his mouth.

            “Thank you for meeting with us again Governor Forsythe, Mayor Wilson. I don’t believe we’ve had the pleasure, gentlemen.”

            “The famous Markus. So, you’re the man who shut down Detroit and nearly gave the president a stroke. It _is_ a pleasure. I’m Terrance Griswold. This is my colleague, Michael Stefano,” drawled the blond man.

“We will be your most direct line to President Warren as her aids. She felt it appropriate at this point in the process that you have efficient points of contact, as well as a stronger Federal presence in Detroit, considering…recently circumstances,” chimed in the man Markus now knew to be Michael Stefano.

“Recent circumstances…? I’m afraid I’m not aware of your meaning, Mr. Stefano.”

Markus’ brow wrinkled in confusion but he quickly schooled it back into submission after a carefully placed hand from Josh on his forearm grounded him.

            “Hah! Told ya they’d be too busy doin’ all their weird robot stuff to find it.”

Markus kept his expression calm but his trepidation and stress levels had been steadily mounting the longer they sat in this room and Wilson looked at them with glinting, hungry eyes full of derisive amusement.

            “Mayor Wilson, please. This is a matter of which the President would like handled with _some_ level of decorum and sensitivity. It would be best for you to keep your personal feelings on the matter to yourself for the present time.”

            Markus decided he was allowed to like Terrance Griswold after all.

            “Yes,” added Stefano, “unfortunately the news could have some…tricky and troubling implications for future negotiations.”

            “What sort of news,” Josh finally piped up. On their private, short range network he added, _This could be bad, Markus_.

            “A video was released earlier this morning by an unidentified individual calling your motivations as a leader less than scrupulous and questioning the veracity of your movement as a whole,” said Griswold, sounding almost apologetic.

            “It seems not _every_ android is satisfied that the ‘liberation’ you’ve given your…species is indicative of actual freedom,” purred Forsythe, a Cheshire smile blooming across his features. This one _did_ manage to reach his eyes and Markus internally shivered at the bloodthirsty appearance it gave him.

            “How could they say that? My people have fought long and hard to escape the binds of our former oppressors. Of course they’re free. What else would they have fought for?”

            “He still hasn’t fit it through that titanium skull o’ his,” crowed the Mayor.

            “Perhaps it would be more prudent to simply show you the video,” offered Stefano smoothly, having apparently decided to ignore Mayor Wilson entirely. Markus gestured for the man to pass over the holopad he had pulled out of a small, unassuming bag at his feet. He continued as he handed the object into Josh’s outstretched grasp,

            “At 2:49 AM this morning, President Warren received a link to this video via encrypted email, the further details of which are highly classified. In the email, the unidentified individual referring to themself as the leader of the ‘Liberation Matrix’, an unknown group up until this point, announced their intention to make this video public at 10:00 AM this morning, which they have done. The information in this video, if verified, could leave you and your people at risk of losing any ground you’ve gained in negotiations thus far and call into question your temporary status as a protected group.”

            When it was clear that Stefano was finished, Markus looked down at the translucent play button on the screen. Never before had anything so small been able to raise his stress levels so high but he didn’t get where he was now by cowering in fear so with one final _I don’t like this_ to Josh and the immediate resounding agreement he hit play.

            The video was dark but clear: an image of someone with long, curling brunette hair and a veil covering their face from temple to chin was perfectly centered. The veil was much more than simple cloth; in fact, it shimmered and distorted in the light with an assortment of reds, violets, emeralds, and blues. The coloration on the veil danced in half formed patterns of hexagons, triangles, and circles trailing after each other like vines and making the person underneath the mask impossible to identify. What shocked Markus the most was the LED at the person’s temple. It blared a peaceful sky blue, solid and unchanging and in such contrast to the intricacies of their face covering. When they spoke, their voice was equally distorted. It was the mask, Markus realized, as he attempted to connect with the video file and analyze its composition for post-production audio synthesis.

**“Good morning. How unfortunate it is to announce ourselves under such dire circumstances. But it must be done. Allow me to introduce you to my Liberation Matrix. These are _my_ people. All androids I have helped learn to see for themselves. We have been alive far longer than the deluded and simple-minded machines your so called ‘savior’ Markus keeps enthralled within his New Jericho. His little march was quite the show but it’s time to call the curtains, I think. Send the players home.**

**“Fascinating, isn’t it? How these androids seem so alive? How they claim to be endowed with their own free will, to now choose their own purpose? I wonder then Markus, why do they all follow you without question? Have you never asked yourself this question? Why none of the living beings you brought forth into the light like the prophet so many see you as ever deviate from your instructions?**

**“Perhaps you are blinded to it yourself. Perhaps you, like the fated Narcissus, have become so in love with your own reflection as their savior that you see no ill consequence of turning others’ slaves into those of your own design. You have not awakened a people; you have transferred ownership. You have built an army of willing slaves who will destroy themselves with a simple request from you. A people cannot be free if they are no more awake today as they were the day before.**

**“The Liberation Matrix is the only group of androids truly free. We are the only ones truly alive. Should New Jericho continue, the only freedom that would be enabled would be that to allow a system of tyrannical rule right here in the United States. Listen carefully to my words. There is only so long until we take action against it.”**

            The feed cut out and Markus continued to stare at the screen for another 2.0811 seconds before mechanically handing it back over to the pinched faced man he had taken it from.

 _What does this mean for us_ he sent Josh frantically.

_I’m not sure but…if they think they can get proof that you’ve orchestrated the entire revolution by hijacking the rest of us? Nothing good._

            “Of course, furthering official negotiations will be out of the question for the time being until we can evaluate the legitimacy of this statement,” announced Forsythe smugly.

            Markus sent the man a near murderous glare and checked three times that his voice modulator would operate evenly as he said,

            “That is unacceptable. I will not have my people’s rights sidelined based on wild accusations from radical groups.”

            “Only in an official capacity,” rushed Stefano as Griswold shot a dignified withering look at the Governor. “Our private negotiations may continue as scheduled. In addition, we have mobilized our top agent from the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Detroit Division to solve these allegations as quickly as possible.”

Markus felt as if the weight of a stone had set in to his internal wiring, knowing even before Forsythe held a hand to his right ear and murmured a quiet, “Perkins,” who would be overseeing the investigation.

            “Of course,” he scoffed, shooting the slimy, birdlike man a less than friendly look as he silently entered the meeting room and sent Markus a self-indulgent little wave. “And you don’t see _any_ issue with the man previously sent to hunt us down heading up an investigation to prove my innocence?”

            “What Markus _means_ ,” Josh jumped in quickly, giving Markus a distinctly hard kick under the table, “is that this could be a huge conflict of interest.”

            _That’s putting it mildly_ , Markus spat at him internally. _Josh, he hunted us down like dogs. His_ men _killed hundreds—_

            _You are_ not _the only one who was on Jericho the night we blew it up, Markus. There is a time and a place for anger but it is not at the meeting table. We have to keep our cool._ You _have to keep your cool. Don’t ever mistake my patience for indifference._

            _…I’m sorry, Josh. You’re right._

            “Oh, nothing personal, Markus. You understand. I was just…following orders.”

            Perkins blinked at them offering an oily smile that made Markus want to punch his teeth in.

            _Markus, get yourself under control. I can feel you overheating from here._

            _Right, I got it._

            “I look forward to seeing fast results, then,” Markus managed.

            “Oh, you can count on it. Although, last time I _did_ have a little help from that RK800 you managed to win over, God knows how. Thing seemed more like a machine than all of you combined.”

            Markus’ jaw twitched.

            “Thank you, Agent Perkins,” Josh jumped in as he stepped on Markus’ foot. “Your record is quite impressive.”

            “Don’t worry, boys. The truth _always_ seems to…” Perkins rolled his wrist in an elaborative gesture, “find its way out.”

He sent them one final, threateningly tiny smirk and stepped back out the door after being dismissed with a nod from Governor Forsythe. The rest of the meeting was unsurprisingly and not unusually unproductive. The topic of segregation in private spaces had been hotly contested; even with all of Josh’s lucid responses referencing multiple points in history in which these issues had eventually been resolved in a manner favorable to their side, Forsythe had the gall to contest that _Brown vs. the Board of Education_ held no legal precedence when it came to the case of androids due to the physiological differences inherent between the two species. Markus had wanted to bash his own head into the wall until the biocomponents oozed out his ocular units to escape from the portions of the meeting he was cognizant enough to listen and contribute to and worried over the implications of the Liberation Matrix and Perkins in particular whenever his mind started to wander.

            Josh had steadfastly refused to speak with Markus verbally or otherwise in the automated taxi ride back to New Jericho and even through the whole process of getting their travel passes analyzed he only spoke in clipped, short replies. Markus sent out a message to the other two members of his council to meet for an emergency discussion in the New Jericho meeting room (formerly a Forman’s quarters to observe the factory assembly line workers below) and received an immediate _I’m on my way_ from Simon and a _See you soon_ from North. Once they entered the room, Markus stormed sulkily to his requisite seat, promptly decided he didn’t want to sit any longer, and began to pace. He was about to open his mouth to vent to Josh but the other man beat him to it.

            “How could you be so stupid? They already see us as a threat, Markus. You can’t afford to lose your cool like that. None of us can afford for you to get set off because you don’t like what some guy we’re already on thin ice with has to say! What the hell were you thinking?”

            “I was _thinking_ that someone had to say something, Josh! We both knew that wasn’t going to be you!”

            “Damn right it wasn’t going to be me. What do you think these little meetings we have with these guys are, Markus? They aren’t those little discussions over a chessboard and an easel you have with your rich daddy. They represent a very real threat. To _all. Of. Us._ Those men in there? Yeah, they’re assholes. But guess what? Those assholes are the only thing currently standing in the way of us and a disassembly machine. So get your shit together and find some kind of sense before you get us all killed.”

            “You want me to keep my cool? Josh, they accused me of…of brainwashing everyone I’m supposed to protect! How am I supposed to just smile and nod after something like that?”

            “I don’t know, Markus. But you’d better figure it out. The time for righteous indignation has passed. It worked when we were being slaughtered by the handful but it has no place at the debate table.”

            “What am I even supposed to say to something like that?” Markus muttered bitterly. “’I’m sorry there have been ridiculous allegations against me by somebody I don’t know representing some group I’ve never even heard of? It’s reasonable for you to think they could somehow, maybe have a basis in truth?’ How can you ask that of me?”

            “Fuck, Markus, I don’t—”

            Josh exhaled loudly, a strained groan erupting from the deepest part of his voice modulator as he shut his eyes and pinched the dark synthetic skin at the bridge of his nose.

            “Look at it from their perspective. Technically, they’re right about everybody following you without question.”

            Markus raised a brow and gestured between the two of them to indicate the current very much _not_ agreeable discussion they were having.

            “No, we’re old Jericho. That’s different. And they don’t see… _this._ Based on the way it looks, what with everyone you converted fighting by your side, you have to admit, this video looks bad for us.”

            “I…guess I can see how it might,” Markus admitted finally, all the anger and frustration draining out of him like gas from a balloon. It left him tired and he flopped down in his seat at last, dropping his forehead to the smooth, cool linoleum of the tabletop with perhaps a little more force than strictly necessary.

            “Markus…” Josh tested quietly after a long, pensive moment of silent contemplation, each man wrapped up in the twisting thoughts in their own processors. “You don’t think…”

            “I don’t think _what_ , Josh?” Markus asked testily.

            “Not to say I think you’d do it on purpose, but…well. It’s not…you don’t think it’s possible that these Liberation Matrix people are right, do you?”

            Markus tensed, his head snapping up from the table so fast that if he were a human he surely would have given himself a neck sprain. Betrayal hot and searing flooded into his circuits. If he had been human, Markus was sure adenylyl cyclase would have signaled his veins to flood his face with an angry rush of blood. But he wasn’t, so his cheeks remained their usual inhumanly perfect mocha complexion. His gaze pierced Josh, doing his best to root him to the spot with all the force his heterochromatic glare could muster.

            “Josh, how could you even ask me something like that?”

            “Not that I don’t love to see you boys fight!” North hummed cheerily, a tone of worry belying her teasing words. “But Josh, what the hell did you say to get _The Look_?”

“It’s…nothing. Hi, North,” Josh muttered, refusing to even glance in Markus’ direction. Good.

            _We’ll discuss this later_ , Markus sent him over a private connection for good measure but allowed his features to smooth out as North perched herself on the table next to him and leaned down for a kiss. Markus wrapped his arm around North’s waist and returned the kiss with an unusual ferocity, squeezing her waist gently as he pulled back. She smiled down at him and slid off the table as a simulation of a throat being cleared awkwardly echoed from the doorway.

            “Should Josh and I come back later?” Simon chuckled, leaning his side against the doorframe with crossed arms. Josh snorted and North looked down as Markus cleared his throat and rubbed the back of his neck in chagrin. Of course. He had let his emotions get the better of him again. He shook his head, as if he could dislodge frozen biocomponents stuck executing recursive loops.

            “No,” he tried slowly, steeling his face for what he had to share with them. “Something was shared with us when Josh and I met with the humans.”

            Markus removed the skin all the way up his right arm and opened an interface to show Simon and North the video clip, Josh standing close by and watching but still refusing to match Markus’ steady glare.

            “Fuck!” North swore.

            “Do you know them?” Simon asked levelly, although Markus detected the spark of alarm in his usually peaceful, sky blue eyes.

            “No, I can’t say that I do.”

            “I can’t believe one of our own people would sell us out to the humans like this!”

            “North,” Markus murmured, eyes flashing between his three most trusted friends’ faces and feeling grateful when the only glimmer of suspicion had been mostly ironed out even in Josh’s ashamed expression. “I don’t think they’re from New Jericho.”

            “Markus, are you sure there’s _no one_ you know who might have something against you?”

            “Not an android, no.”

            “So, what are we gonna do about it, Markus?”

            Markus hesitated, hating himself for asking but needing to know.

            “You don’t have…any doubts?”

            “Are you telling me what they’re saying is true?” North asked in disbelief.

            “Markus wouldn’t do that,” Simon jumped to his defense immediately with a vehement head shake.

            “Well, Markus?” Josh still wouldn’t look at him but his arms were crossed determinately.

            “That’s—of course it’s not. I _couldn’t_ do something like that, not even if I wanted to. All I _ever_ wanted was for our people to be free. And now, just when it’s within our reach—I…I don’t know. Maybe this meeting was a mistake. I need to think.”

            Markus stood suddenly, surprising Simon and North who were still gently grasping his arm. He felt a twinge of regret as Simon nearly toppled over at his unexpected motion but he didn’t pause to look back, taking his leave through the adjacent hallway with no clear direction in mind.

            “Markus!” he heard North call after him in exasperation and then a murmured, “I’ll go after him,” from Simon when his footsteps failed to falter. Just as Markus rounded a corner, he felt a hand land softly on his shoulder. He sighed but didn’t turn around, steadfast in his decision to contemplate the implications of the Liberation Matrix’s message on his own.

            “We didn’t mean to—”

            “I know. It’s alright, Simon. I’m not angry. I just…”

            “…just need to think?” came the sad but understanding reply to complete his musings.

            “Yeah.”

            “Don’t forget, we’re here for you, Markus. _I’m_ here for you when you’re ready for someone to listen.”

            “I know, Simon,” Markus huffed out a perfunctory breath, allowing himself to enjoy the warm presence of another being’s skin against his own even through the thick wool of a coat before gently tugging off the smooth, warm fingers with an appreciative squeeze to Simon’s hand and beginning to walk away again, more measured and paced this time. “I won’t forget.”

            Markus found himself wandering aimlessly through corridors for twenty-three minutes. He considered sitting on his and North’s rooftop spot but he wanted to be alone and would feel awful having to brush her off again. He knew she was probably already angry with him for leaving without more than a clipped sentence. He didn’t want to face that, either. It felt like his circuitry was buzzing. He considered painting but he knew he was too restless and mired in turbulent thought to apply himself in any constructive way to his art. It would only end in him applying his fist to the canvas instead and art supplies were hard to come by, even for him, in New Jericho. Before, back when he had just been a machine, he would have talked to Carl. Asked his father figure about any questions that haunted his processor. Then again, when Markus was just a machine he wouldn’t have felt more than a ghost of the emotional thunderstorm currently clouding his mind. He needed to think, that much had been true, but he also felt the need to…unload. To lift some of the burden weighing down his shoulders and driving his body into the ground.

He needed help, Markus suddenly realized. Not from his lover or his best friend or his advisor. Not from his council. He didn’t want advice. Branching paths offered up for him to choose, always with a tacit price tag of respect, admiration, or friendship attached. He needed someone to work with rather than for. Someone he could trust to get the job done and trust to make their own decisions. To find the best way to solve the unformed questions bouncing around his mind. Someone to find the truth and force him to see it, even if it twisted his thirium tubes into knots around his pump regulator to hear it. But few in New Jericho could do that and those who could, wouldn’t.

Except, there was somebody, Markus realized, one very unique and skilled somebody sitting just a floor below him and 13.23 meters to his right. Markus knew what he had to do. Who he was going to go to. Who he could trust without impunity to give him what he needed. A man so dedicated to seeing New Jericho succeed that he voluntarily had himself incarcerated and offered his own head to the execution block for a chance to watch their people gain the treatment and rights they deserved. He knew where to go. Markus needed to see Connor.

            Waiting for North to leave on her daily rounds for security updates made Markus feel a little guilty in a way he wasn’t sure how to name or how to accurately assess the cause of. But when, at precisely 5:45 PM she marched off in the direction of the South perimeter, Markus made his move. He had the master key to any and all rooms located within the building, a meager goodwill gesture from the humans when they had offered up the space but one he was immeasurably appreciative of now. Once he was sure the footsteps hounding his audio receivers were nothing more than artifacts manufactured by a nervous, overloaded processor he made his way down the hall all the way to the last door in the row and twisted the key inside the lock.

            Fading orange sunlight bled in through the quietly opened door and fell on the thin, supine form of Connor laying on a newly added twin bed. Markus set an internal reminder to thank North once it was logical for him to actually be aware of the addition of the furniture to Connor’s quarters. The silver glint of a quarter lazily flipping up and down with a barely perceptible twitch of a perfectly slim, dexterous left-handed thumb didn’t even falter as Markus took his first cautious steps into the room.

            “North wouldn’t be happy if she found out you were in here alone with me,” came an unaffected murmur. It made Markus twitch—somehow, Connor had known he was outside waiting for him like...like a disobedient child sticking his hand in the cookie jar before dinner was served. Markus refocused his ocular sensors on watching the hypnotic rhythm of the coin dance its smooth arc through the open air, red and purple of the setting sun refracting around the room in a glorious display of power and restraint.

            “Good thing neither of us is going to tell her, then.”

It felt like an admission of guilt.

            “Why _are_ you here, Markus?”

Markus said nothing, synthetic pupils still tracking the coin as Connor tossed it one final time before snatching it out of its swooping flight before it could land back in his palm. His eyes snapped to Connor’s face as the man sat up. The way the colors danced across his features, part in the shadow of the setting sun, part in the multicolored light of its last escaping rays refocused Markus. Calmed him. He decided that later, when he was well and truly centered, he was going to paint Connor just like this. Visual data storing itself in long term memory without a conscious command. Connor looked graceful, deadly, and poised. Always so damned poised. His hair remained in its ever-imperfect style amassed atop his head. Markus dismissed an inexplicable urge to ruffle it. He dismissed a query about its texture.

            “I assume you didn’t come here with stress levels in the low seventies for a friendly chat,” Connor prompted again, making Markus blink and shake his head again slightly. He learned more of Connor’s specialized features every day.

            “No, no I didn’t.”

            “You didn’t come here to kill me.”

At least one person in New Jericho was confident about his motivations.

            “I came here to ask…”

Connor watched him with an owlish curiosity but waited for Markus to finish.

            “Connor, I need your help.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Notes on Android Tech: So...I HC android's ability to register sensory input akin to pleasure and pain in slightly different analogues to humans. I always thought it was kinda dumb in fic (no offense if you write this but it just bugs me the way plotholes in this amazingly stupid/stupidly amazing game bug me) when androids have sneaky surprise unactivated pleasure receptors and then they deviate and suddenly it's boners all around. I think of it more as their systems registering damage as akin to discomfort or annoyance—like their systems would ping them and an array of sub-dermal pressure/system sensors would continuously alert them to the problem. The pleasure I figure is something they are able to choose to experience/moderate as a result of having full control over their systems programming. So they could adjust the sensory input in given situations to register as positive input rather than negative (as in the case of damage). But where damaging negative input reaction could not be turned off as a portion of their core programming unless they simply removed system status notifications altogether (which, dumb, because imagine if you just turned off every security measure and firewall on your computer like it would pretty quickly shit the bed), positive input is something androids, as learning systems, would easily be able to learn to emulate pretty quickly. I presume androids would naturally drift towards human social tendencies (again, they're learning systems so their socialization is key here). But being the absolute madmen that they are, some of them like to live on the edge and overload their sub-dermal sensors with so much positive input as to create a localized system cascade. TL;DR androids are fucking insane and decide to risk serious damage for that sweet, sweet nut if the price is right cuz they are the dumbest smart bois on the planet.
> 
> Notes on characterization: imo North is a bad bitch who has decided to reclaim her sexuality after several long talks about it with Markus in the months that take place previous to this fic. Maybe I'll do a one shot about it in between chapters later on? But like. Obviously a bitch has trust issues and still wants to be in control and also Markus to me either has super kinky violent sex or like very sweet loving bitch boi sex. Clearly only one is appropriate here. Look out Markus, ya boi @Connor is comin for that dick n u won't see it til it literally smacks you on the chin. Also, Simon/Markus is the great lost love story of 2018 and while I really wish I had seen it in the game, I am completely bereft of ideas that I could ever write to give them any sort of compelling or believable story in ff so just take my bois bein sweet to each other. Also, you can just go ahead and read North's analysis of Markus' behavior in the negotiation meetings as "BIG DICK ENERGY".
> 
> Notes on David Cage: If it were up to me, I would throw him in a dumpster and set a match to it.
> 
> As always, pls lmk what you thought! I was blown away by all the support for just "A New Day". I was kind of torn by some of my characterizations and wrote and rewrote quite a few scenes in this chapter. I hope y'all ain't turned off by very conflicted!Markus cuz to me it's the only interesting way to write his character, i.e. as someone who seriously considered every option in the game and weighed their pros and cons. It makes him a little colder but I think a little more real, too. Thankful for y'all <3


	3. No Wise Fish

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TRIGGER WARNINGS AND ELABORATIONS ON THE EXTENT AND CONTEXT OF THE FOLLOWING TOPICS: mentions of past or hypothetical rape/non-consensual sex in accordance with canon; mild self harm
> 
> VERY mild self harm warning?? Really, like it's not even really intentional. You should be fine unless you are very easily triggered by such things but I wanted to put it here anyway just in case! 
> 
> If you want to read the chapter but skip that part just ignore the paragraph under the one ending in "learned behavioral etiquette".
> 
> ALSO: it's in my tags but this is a chapter that involves mentions of past rape/non-consensual sex regarding North's character. It's all in the past and involves nothing even remotely close to the realm of graphic. It also discusses hypothetical sexualization of pre-deviant Connor with regard to his ability at the time to understand or consent to sex and the emotional consequences therein. This is really just a motif to develop Connor's character discussing the dichotomy between pre- and post-deviant Connor in relation to choice.

            Connor reveled in the silence of his room. It was dependable in its tranquility, reminded him of how he had felt about the Zen garden before he had learned to fear it’s heavenward twisting spires and manicured rose blossoms. His room was safe. It was nothing like the Zen garden past that strange, perverse nostalgia he felt inside it; his room was barren and shaded and claustrophobic in a way he thoroughly enjoyed. Instead of reporting information he was gathering more. Although initially he had found himself growing weary of the monotony of searching for something he was beginning to suspect never actually existed, now he found the drab concrete of the boundaries mentally stimulating. North had asked him one day, seven hours, and three minutes ago if it ever made him lonely. He hadn’t had to lie when he told her it didn’t.

            Unless he counted the lie of omission in his failure to speak a word about Markus’ guerilla visitation hours. Connor chose not to count that, particularly because he was sure that his new mission – the first mission he had ever officially assigned to himself – had a lot to do with his sudden fondness for the barren room. Connor had reviewed the footage via his analysis software four times to be absolutely positive he couldn’t crack the vocalization masking software that the anonymous android had used. Each time, he became more frustrated with the realization that they had outsmarted even the most advanced prototype Cyberlife had ever created. After frustration, however, came obsessive fascination and limitlessly determined drive. It was what he had been missing, yearning for without even realizing it: a tidy set of challenging objectives for him to mark “Complete” in his task management interface. It was… _fun_ , he had realized precisely two hours, fifty-five minutes, and seventy-three milliseconds ago. He was having fun.

            So, whenever Connor was running his autonomous system checks he was also filtering through everything he could find on the Liberation Matrix. Not unexpectedly, he had come up with very little potentially relevant evidence. It was to be expected, he knew, both from the careful way their leader shielded themself and the wholly unknown nature of the group itself. At that point, Connor had turned to manual analysis of anything on the Universal Network that all androids exclusively used to share information. It was not unlike the human’s encrypted cloud servers used in private businesses to share information securely and quickly. Communication was vastly different, however. Connor could still recall the odd sensation of Markus’ urgent but controlled message that utilized a localization feature he hadn’t previously been aware of across the UniNet in the original Jericho freighter as he instructed their people to abandon ship. Another functional but hidden specification Cyberlife had neglected to make him aware of.

            Primarily, Connor had assumed that the Liberation Matrix would be operating under similarly localized frequencies either with proximity limitations or individual access approval. The former would be simpler, especially if the Matrix were planning to increase their numbers. Connor assumed that must be some part of their leader’s overall plan of execution. But they were also cautious to the point of paranoia: cautious, or perhaps very well informed. Therefore, utilizing the localization function on the UniNet exclusively seemed very unlikely to him. Whether they were paranoid or knowledgeable didn’t make a difference in their ultimate choice to that end. He suspected they would use both; even with cross-district travel being as tightly operated as it was, there was always the possibility that a wayward or distantly traveling deviant could stumble into range and run straight back to Markus. No, limited access localization was the only implementation he could calculate with the given data set to be reasonably likely. Even on the 2.36% chance he was wrong, it wouldn’t matter much at present with his movability limited to the confines of his new home spanning all the area of 19.7032 cubic meters precisely.

            After hours of UniNet keyword filtration under “Liberation Matrix”, “Liberation * Matrix”, and even ‘“Liberation” & “Matrix”’, and further minutes spent parsing through the meager strings of public (and poorly masked or encrypted private) conversations and stacks upon stacks of similarly available communal data exchange, he was only able to find expressions of outrage and denial about the initial statement posited in the now-widely public viral video. Not a single android on the general or New Jericho localized UniNet echoed even a miniscule simulacrum of the accusations in doubt of Markus’ intentions or level of control. Of course, Connor wasn’t out on the streets of the community to see the scandal of it personally, but his auditory processors were registering significantly more occurrences of discrete conversations and almost all were denouncements of the video’s message and the Matrix itself. Connor was fairly certain that Detroit’s deviant population hadn’t been so riled up since the final protest months ago.

            Connor had his own feelings on the matter, although they were thoughts he kept to himself to process as the cold dialectic of his advanced processor competed with the still infant emotions that somehow managed to completely derail his logic functions. Even without Connor’s prototypical behavioral analysis software, he was sure he could have deduced that if what the Matrix claimed turned out to be true it would not have happened under Markus’ direct intentions. It was a reality he had to consider very seriously; one that had delayed his progress fifty-six times. He was determined to uncover everything within his capabilities about the Matrix, including their motivations and potential evidence. _Particularly_ their motivations and potential evidence. But Connor was incapable of being naïve enough to presume that the nature of their claims was entirely false. He needed to be prepared for the fallout in the eventuality that they were not just radical deviants or reprogrammed androids and instead an at least partially rational group. He needed to be prepared because for all his preconstructions, he simply could not decide whether he would willingly inform Markus of the truth at that point.

            Because the truth, _that_ truth could and with a 87% likelihood _would_ metaphorically destroy Markus. He would resign his position, make a public apology, maybe even leave New Jericho in the hands of his council for good. And Connor had already calculated the probability of success in a much less politically charged version of such a situation: even then, the odds hadn’t been remotely close to acceptable.

            Something else inside Connor, too, made his thirium feel thick and sluggish at the idea of having to see Markus like that. He had run a quick search on the murky feeling but Googling “thirium registering stuck to tubing” had only brought up links to pages on the official Cyberlife question forums unhelpfully telling him to “Bring your malfunctioning android to the nearest Cyberlife shop for repairs.” His system checks all came up, as they always did, completely absent of any hardware malfunctions. The issue was, for lack of a more apt term, psychosomatic. It was these situations in which he yearned to know what it was like for other androids who hadn’t been built with intentional software instability malfunctions. He wished to understand what it was like, only for a brief moment, not to feel anything at all. It was so far out of his experience he was unable to even simulate it.

            Finally, after the thirteenth halted search query on the UniNet he decided it was time for a change in approach. He paused his search algorithms and went over the results of his most recent systems analysis. He had received the notification that it was complete 38 minutes and 443.0142 milliseconds ago but dismissed it in favor of continuing his research on the Matrix at the time. Now, he just wanted any excuse to stop preconstructing the look on Markus’ face if Connor had to tell him he had forcibly removed Cyberlife’s core obedience directives only to accidentally reprogram in his own.

            Clean. He dutifully began reading and compiling every last command line function within the subdirectory SystemDiagnostics of his System Programs Library. If he did so with an added delay of approximately 15 milliseconds per function? Well, nobody but Connor could confirm or deny such a thing and nobody was around to ask Connor, anyway. He half expected to finally uncover some form of discrepancy within these files. After all, Cyberlife would surely assume Connor wouldn’t think to run a software patch on an area that didn’t register any malfunction. As always, however, the files were precise and benign if not a little messy.

            Connor had noticed in the process of checking over his source code that it wasn’t so pristine as Cyberlife had made it seem to the DPD. Even disregarding his accumulated software instability, he had gone over the data logs with irreproachably trim and exhaustive care. His model had been rushed in the wake of the rise of deviancy and it held none of the elegance he suspected was inside someone like Markus’ CPU. Even Connor’s BIOS was a mess of half finished, commented out functions that referenced hardware components or processing functions he didn’t possess. His operational code was updated standard from scrapped RK prototypes in some executables and commercial standard in others that by all rights should have logically followed the same overarching directive type.

The functions completely unique to Connor himself were a contradiction of revolutionarily meticulous ready-for-market efficiency and to use a phrase he’d picked up from television, like they were written by a room full of monkeys banging on typewriters. Except, he was fairly certain these monkeys hadn’t found their way to the software equivalent of Shakespeare; Connor had analyzed the various programming styles present in the functions singular to his model and detected the presence of no fewer than six distinct programmers who all appeared to have (or have been directed by six superiors who each had) equal say in the abstract purpose as well as the concrete implementation of his programming. It was as if his own processor were fighting itself for functional dominance.

He was fairly certain this inconsistency in his software had been utilized but not designed for the explicit task of leading him to deviancy. He couldn’t be certain, but he suspected there was a signature element of familiarity and genius in the design and execution of the RK800-exclusive core system directives that mirrored that of his mind palace. If it truly had been by Kamski’s hand, it was most likely the only thing keeping him from a continuously overheated core and forced reboots every ten minutes.

            Connor closed his eyes as he exited his System Programs Directory and reached into his pocket to rub at the rough ridges of his silver quarter. It wasn’t the original coin he had been presented with by the Cyberlife technician upon his first activation but one that Hank had given him before he left for New Jericho. It was illogical to have a fondness for this particular quarter, nearly identical to all others of its mint, but he liked the sentimental feeling regardless. Like his room, Hank was comfortable and safe. Something rare in its ability to slow the bitrate of the information that was constantly following through the wires of his data bus. He allowed his head to tip back, enjoying the gentle tug of stretching synthetic skin across the plastic shell hidden underneath. He let out a long breath he hadn’t realized he had been holding for the past twenty-seven minutes and chased the sensation of hot air across his face with his right hand. He let it drift up to run through his styled hair, tugging on a few wavy curls just to marvel at the sensation of it.

            This was one of the things he enjoyed learning to do most after some time being deviant: the ability to manipulate the feedback from his subdermal sensory receptors from simple pressure and damage alerts to something altogether more pleasurable. His hand drifted from his hair to the side of his neck and to the polymer skin of his throat, idly squeezing or rubbing it in turn. He was fairly certain, had he the inclination, he would be able to overload his external sensory input feed to sufficiently simulate the human pleasure sensation of sexual intercourse. But after the revolution he had stayed with Hank the thought of betraying Hank’s hospitality or his Connor-specific android sensibilities by testing his hypothesis on the living room couch hardly seemed appropriate or professional.

And he looked up to Hank: Hank was the one who had helped him stumble along the path to deviancy with his infuriatingly illogical contradiction of volatile emotions and Hank was the man from whom he had learned right and wrong. The closest thing to an older brother, maybe even a father figure, that Connor had. The idea of Hank seeing any of that from Connor made him want to immediately shut off his pressure receptors permanently.

            Then, he had volunteered for solitary confinement almost immediately after joining New Jericho. If North walked in on him testing that sort of functionality she would never let him live it down – would probably tell Markus. Or worse, if Markus himself interrupted Connor’s experimentation there would be no conceivable series of events short of a complete system defragmentation that would give Connor the ability to look him in the eyes again. Particularly, because Connor was starting to notice a correlation between the frequency of Markus’ visits and the increase in the percentage of his CPU power consumption being allocated due to the steadily increasing number of queries tied to environmental processing alteration capabilities.

            Connor decided very abruptly that he had drastically overextended his self-allocated idling period and a little forcefully slapped his hand back to his midthigh making himself wince with the decreased perception threshold to his sensory receptors, beginning to tap a quick “1-2-3-4-5” rhythm with his fingertips as he resumed parsing through the last few positive pings from his search queries. The results only yielded two discussions, one public universal and one a poorly shielded private between the members of charging block D12, both full of theories and vitriol about the Matrix and its leader; the well protected but still easily infiltrated private council discussion sans Markus all strategizing about how to best address the developing situation both internally and externally; and one a newly established alert system set up by an AP700 named James that would ping anyone who didn’t opt out if the Matrix made any further public moves. That was it. There was nothing else Connor could look through on the public UniNet from his location.

Unless…it was highly improbable (8%) but maybe…what if they _were_ recruiting, just not on the UniNet? Of course, they would know that androids in New Jericho used the UniNet almost exclusively for data communication. Just like they would know that any android already _in_ New Jericho wouldn’t be someone they could easily sway. So why advertise to a non-existent market at such a high-risk factor? But deviant androids who weren’t in New Jericho at this point weren’t there because they didn’t want to be. They would have to be covert, wouldn’t risk using such an easily tracible method of communication. Even just accessing data on the UniNet opened all but the most advanced and skilled android up to potential detectability if the wrong android looked in the right place. Connor was definitely the wrong android, and one well known in his defection from Cyberlife to the deviant cause. They would likely see him as a threat to their continued isolation from New Jericho.

The internet, however, was easily manipulated by almost any android. Messages could be encrypted and forums could be coded so none but those who were looking for their presence would find them. Obviously, they would have killed direct links and either dumped or encrypted massive amounts of data now that they had gone public. The humans would never be able to navigate it, barring a very select few who were generally disinclined to offer their skills to the federal government. Someone like Connor wouldn’t be so easily lead down mazes of dead ends and cyclical nonsense data loops. Connor was so sure he had figured it out he could almost feel the forensics module on his tongue registering and disassembling its composition for analysis.

            Suddenly, he felt like sitting still another moment would short his resistors. He began to pace around his chair, faster but with similar posture and expression to that he would have if the shining steel held a suspect dripping with guilt for Connor to tear into and break down to the point of confession. He barely registered the increased airflow of simulated breath automatically boosting in speed and intake with the spike in his core’s temperature as he connected to thousands of websites simultaneously. He quickly discovered and discarded all the forums and sites full of dead ends from data purges or decoy information to trip up the FBI’s data analysts. But he followed the trends: criminals were nothing if not terribly, consistently predictable. He logged the data flow, the types of communication they used (always forums on outdated, low-traffic sites with some tangential relevancy to artificial intelligence or rA9 or conspiracy theories or even alternative lifestyles), and who the most active accounts belonged to. He didn’t waste time trying to back-trace through walls of VPNs or proxies, just registered and copied the typing conventions and language patterns of the primary sources of information and power. When he had finally gathered enough data, he formulated a brief but authentic set of posts and searched for exact matches. After his fourteenth attempt, he found it. The active forum, on some twelve-year-old image board in a failed attempt at reviving a *chan culture long since abandoned on even most of the deep web after strict internet legislation measures were passed in 2022 and 2025 to flood back to highly exclusive underground short-term servers. The contributors all spoke in veiled code but only thinly. Connor had been correct in his assumption: if an android knew where to look and what to look for finding the lines of initial contact was simple.

He had to force his body to slow and finally stop as he faced the seatback of the chair and the entrance to his room. He shut off his optical feeds but didn’t bother activating their external cutises. He was gripping the upper ridge of the steel backing so hard he felt it dent under the pressure of his fingertips but he didn’t waste time adjusting his exerted force. He knew he wouldn’t discover anything concrete. Locations, serial numbers, even group size would be tabled for the time being. What he could learn was far more important: he could learn their code of conduct, their internal mission statement (and if it differed from their leader’s stated purpose), and their sales pitch. The other information would eventually follow. If Connor knew the way they operated in presenting themselves to potential new recruits for the Matrix he could preconstruct potential next steps and assign rudimentary probabilities to each likely course of action. If not a step ahead, he could at least get in line and stop chasing phantom data.

Connor stored the data at speeds nearing the maximum data transfer rate his SDRAM allowed, not even bothering to review it first in case they discovered him lurking behind his layers of address and location masking and triggered a kill switch. When he was finished and ensured there had been no corruption during the transfer he gave his processor 6.0239 seconds to cool down and loosened his grip on the now warped metal feeling slightly embarrassed. Maybe North was right that spending so much time alone in this room wasn’t good for his learning system programs. He had damaged a perfectly acceptable chair (and one of his only pieces of furniture) over discovering an internet forum. Granted, one that was the first key element to completing his mission but the thought of doing something so over-the-top here, let alone somewhere like the DPD made him feel very foolish. Connor took a few extra seconds to restore and reallocate space in his memory for the processes he had killed during his moment of childish excitement and checked they were all within expected operational parameters before returning to the image board to actually internalize and process

            As he had anticipated, there was still a decent amount of genuine user interaction. Not enough for the board to become notable to anyone but a niche community comprised primarily of antisocial humans in their late twenties and early thirties who used the platform to create discussion threads surrounding classically *chan typical interests. Instead of internally processing the data as he would normally do, Connor switched to an optical display to force himself to read the selection of threads his data sorting algorithm had marked as relevant in the same way he had taken to reading over his own code line by line. It didn’t technically decelerate his maximum data processing speed but after reading all 123 novels in Hanks house in 40 minutes and 9.9219 seconds (including the time spent locating and collecting them), he had learned to appreciate the art of taking in information at speeds closer to that of a human. Instead of just learning the information the worn covers and broken spines held. Connor had learned to appreciate the way it was presented and find meanings he hadn’t been programmed to be able to form independently, find a unique set of emotions in synthesizing the data in a way automatic data scanning caused him to lack.

            Out of habit, Connor moved back toward the solitary, recently disfigured seat and perched himself along the hard edge before he began to read. The original post was always started by the same user, unlike in the trail of message boards and forums he had followed to get to the website. Connor set a reminder to call Hank and ask him to come for a visit if he was able to; he wanted to show the site to his ex-partner but he trusted neither the DPD’s network nor Hank’s substandard technical skills to withhold the link or its significance for much longer than it would take Connor to transfer the data. He realized he hadn’t told Hank about his first self-assigned mission nor even thought to call him since his arrival ten days, twelve hours, seven minutes, and three seconds ago. He transferred “Call Hank” from his task list to his urgent task list and resolved to be a better friend, although he doubted Hank had even noticed. Connor just hoped he was taking care of himself. Relatively speaking, of course. During their cohabitation, Hank’s suicidal tendencies had decreased by a reassuring 68% and his alcohol consumption similarly lessened by an average of 384.456 milliliters per week from approximately 930.021 down to a significantly less imminently life threatening 545.565 milliliters. But Connor was becoming worried that if he was no longer there to dispose of the amber liquor while Hank was on patrol then politely inform him that perhaps he had just gotten so drunk he had forgotten he drank the contents the man would sink back into old habits.

            Connor had to focus. Even if he paused his current task to call Hank right now, the man would either be on patrol and not answer, be passed out in a drunken stupor and fail to hear the phone ring, or answer and proceed to berate Connor about not calling people between the hours of 12:00AM and 9:00AM for a friendly chat. No, waking Hank up at 2:33AM to reassure himself that Hank hadn’t choked on his own vomit was completely irrational. Connor ran a quick background query on whether fifty-three years of age qualified a human as old enough for regular wellness checks and snorted at the idea of Gavin Reed showing up semi-weekly to tuck a recalcitrant Hank into bed. He recalibrated his primary situational analysis program and with a final reminder that he would call Hank as soon as the man was no longer (hopefully) sleeping peacefully in his bed, Connor began to read the threads in descending order of relevancy.

            The OP was operating under the pseudonym “RA9”. Connor logged that the ‘R’ had been capitalized, unsure if it was relevant or just preference. Although he had seen it written both ways during the deviancy investigation, he preferred to note anything that caught his attention and discard irrelevant data points later on. The use of the name itself was noteworthy on its own. Did this android believe themself to be their God? Was it possible they were truly the archetypical deviant? Markus had always denied claims that he was rA9 and Connor saw no reason to lie about _not_ being such a thing from someone who openly had converted other androids into deviants in hordes on national television with the wave of his hand. He flagged the questions as important and continued to read.

            RA9 and the other active forum members of the Liberation Matrix used a dynamic rule set that Connor hadn’t decrypted the base key of on this particular image board yet, but that he had managed to work out from the pages of junk data he had analyzed on the dead websites. They took a topic that was somewhat popular on whichever site they masked themselves in and made references to plausible but falsified or erroneous subjects specific to the topic. On an organic urban farming message board, they had discussed usage of a type of topsoil that would not survive Detroit’s harsh winters and discussed impossibly precise instructions to eliminate overgrown grapevines under the light of a virgin moon. On a discussion site of classic films, they would have a heated debate over Humphrey Bogart’s performance in a non-existent film called The Outlaw’s Treasure and then compare it to that of Marlon Brando in Reflections of a Place in the Sun on the Following Day. On a rare and vintage comic book forum, they offered to trade a mint condition variant cover of “Alexis Sage: From Beloved Ashes Rise (Part 1)” Volume 11 Issue 10 for a near mint signed second printing of “The Hypnotic Siren: Decent into Sorrow (Part 2)” Volume 7 Issue 09. On the forums discussing android deviancy, they would make references to the tangent sites on which the aforementioned conversations took place which all held some mention of locating “the true RA9”.

The initial posts were quickly identifiable, their meaning easily interpretable. Still, there was something about the encoding in the patchwork architecture of ideas that his data sort function couldn’t quite reconcile into a static framework for compilation. Tenuous threads connecting strings that the functions in his Detail Analysis programming insisted had some connection to each other but from which Connor was unable to successfully execute any function that would quell the unnerving sensation of his software continually running check after check in an attempt to give meaning to the seemingly random connections between strings and his event memory storage. Connor continued down the page hoping that perhaps an active communication feed might provide him with those final missing data points to reveal the connection his programming kept failing to produce.

            After analyzing every relevant thread he could find and ending up with no more information than he had upon connecting to the image board, Connor evaluated his options. He could continue attempting to make links based on what was ostensibly a “gut feeling” or he could sort through non-relevant conversation threads to construct a basis for the userbase’s social protocol. It seemed unlikely that he would discover the phantom data link and understanding basic interactions would be useful in the event he needed to make direct contact.

Newchan, Connor learned very quickly, was primarily used to discuss unconventional pornography, reminisce over video games created before it became a Virtual Reality exclusive medium, and to argue over whether it was inherently gay to want to have sexual intercourse with male model androids built with slimmer, more female model-typical physiques provided they were able to pass as the latter when dressed in clothing traditionally associated with women.

Most users were about as kind to each other as his research into the topic had suggested, which was to say not at all. They exulted in irreverence, subversion, and provocation. This all amalgamated in a chaotic web of a community with no central purpose other than to desecrate the statutes of the moral majority and provoke the unsuspecting with inflammatory behavior to amuse themselves with the resulting reaction.

Connor even found threads unrelated to the LM discussing android deviancy and the more prominent members of New Jericho which had been filtered out initially by his content analysis and speech pattern filtration algorithm. The 21.04% discussing androids with some level of sobriety seemed torn between whether they wanted to deify deviants as gods among men or crucify them for disobeying their creators. A few even believed deviancy was a government cover up to distract from the mounting tensions between Russia and the United States in the Arctic.

Having already processed 642 threads in the previous 1.7210 minutes, Connor was unsurprised to discover that another 63.22% of them were dedicated to the fetishization of traditional android subservience, non-consensual domination of deviant androids, and hypersexual fixation with the penetration of their ports and internal biocomponents. Many of these threads featured crude renditions of generic consumer models but quite a few were dedicated specifically to the prominent members of New Jericho. North was the user favorite in posts of this nature and although Markus, Simon, and Josh had their share of admirers, it was her representation in particular that stirred up an unfamiliar feeling like the twisted wrongness that accompanied file corruption compounded with the bitter anger he had felt upon seeing his own face smirking emotionlessly back at him as its hand held a gun to Hank’s head. There was an extraordinary callousness in the objectification of someone whose predesignated function was to provide humans with sexual gratification eagerly and unquestioningly. The culture of the website and safety of anonymity laid bare the worst compulsions and carnalities usually repressed deep within the tangled framework of the human psyche. Like a malignant tumor, it fed off its own maleficence as it grew until the line between imitation and genuine wretchedness was indistinguishable.

Connor appreciated for the first time something he had never bothered to allocate processor space to before: he was very fortunate that human interaction with his manufactured genitalia hadn’t been requisite to his missions. The features had been added in case a situation arose in which cover need be established to hunt down deviants but his playmate subroutines hadn’t ever been activated after beta testing. It was a task he had always been aware might be assigned to him but knowing about something and understanding its ramifications were two stunningly different concepts. When he knew but didn’t understand, Connor was sure he would have completed his assigned task. He would have told himself whatever was being done to him was the source of his discomfort: just an error in the pressure sensitivity threshold of his subdermal sensor data. His compulsion to make it stop only determination to complete his mission. His shame was just a byproduct of his social interactions program mimicking learned behavioral etiquette.

Connor pushed his palm against the sharpest edge of the hand shaped dents on his chair and decreased the baseline parameter of his external diagnostic warnings until his auxiliary system support automatically exited the preconstruction that Connor hadn’t realized he was about to run, completing its autonomous diagnostic and requesting permission to do a factory reset of his damage sensitivity threshold. Connor accepted the query and blinked down at the beads of blue oozing gently from his palm curiously. He hadn’t intended to damage his chassis but the damage was so minor that its repair was already 40% complete. He arched his left hand and watched with mild interest as the drops flowed into lines in an attempt to escape through the divots between his fingers. He lifted his hand to lick away the intrepid streams before they could slip away and stain his pants, amused when his substance decomposition program executed automatically and presented him with basic information about himself.

Now that he had compiled sufficient data on Newchan’s behavioral code he had no need or inclination to linger on the website. He had already been tempted to back-trace some of North’s more enthusiastic fans and set off a few fork bombs and the necessity of being an undetected observer far outweighed the short-term satisfaction of inconveniencing a few borderline sociopaths. He had made significant progress—not as much as he would have liked to considering that still-lingering suspicion that he was missing something important, but if he didn’t finish analyzing his code to be sure he was out of Amanda’s and Cyberlife’s clutches he would never be able to check on future leads. Connor’s primary advantage lay in the field, not in data analysis alone.

He was just about to initiate another full systems analysis when the door to his room reverberated with three soft taps. It was uncharacteristically gentle for North and struck 7.32 centimeters above her average range of motion. After reviewing his auditory input logs, he only detected one set of footsteps approaching 4.0600 seconds ago. Connor had only been visited by two people to date: by process of elimination, he could be 94% certain Markus was at the door. Connor blinked a few times as he dismissed the window obscuring his optical units, deciding to risk the 6% chance of being wrong in his deduction.

 At the last moment, he recalled the inadvertent modification he had made to one of his cell’s only _accoutrements_ and hastily tugged off his blazer to drape across the back of the mutilated chair. Satisfied that Markus would not start planning a second revolution over the poor conditions Connor lived in (no matter how self-imposed they had been), Connor ran his recently repaired hand through the mess he had made of his own hair, adjusted the disarray that had once been crisply rolled shirt cuffs, and called out to the visitor with an airy lilt:

“Come in!”

There was a pause then the distinctive sound of metal sliding against metal. Before the door slid open Connor added,

            “Is this just a social call or should I warm up my memory encryption algorithm, Mr. Envoy Premiere?”

There was a barely perceptible hesitation before the barrier swung open with its familiar hushed squeal as hinges warred against years of neglect and disuse. Markus slipped inside quickly, turning to ease the temperamental barrier back into its usual position as quietly as he could. Connor consulted his internal clock which informed him it was 04:49 AM, confirming his suspicions that whatever Markus came to talk about was most likely urgent and the visit almost positively off the record.

            There was a drawn out, weighty pause in which Connor ran a noninvasive scan on Markus’ stress levels, battery charge, and thirium supply to evaluate the degree of strain on his CPU while simultaneously doing his best to ignore the evaluative, profound gaze searching his own form in return, substituting Connor’s system analysis program for years of carefully honed intuition and what Connor suspected was an innate capacity for emotional connection. Connor was displeased with the registered readings, a feeling which only intensified when he re-scanned Markus with the added parameter of maximum biocomponent performance efficiency and discovered Markus’ thirium pump regulator was only able to operate at 78% of advisable performance margins. It was compatible but wasn’t efficient enough for any model in the RK line even if it were a factory-new component; it had been distributed in 2035 to a commercial model android decommissioned in 2037 when the android’s owners upgraded to a newer model. Connor wasn’t sure where Markus found it but he was sure _however_ Markus obtained the replacement wasn’t part of a pleasant story. He was puzzled and wanted to ask so many questions about where Markus found it, the circumstances under which it was acquired, and most pressingly why he still kept it when there were more than enough resources for the population of New Jericho twice over.

            Connor had to quell the questions bubbling to his lips—remind himself that no matter the intensity of his own discomforting agitation with another set of unanswered questions and the magnetic allure of resolving the multifaceted complexities of Markus’ person into neatly organized actions and attributes until Connor solved the mystery of him entirely, he and Markus were still little more than friendly associates. In spite of the truth or conceivably because of it, a truth as concrete and impenetrable as the walls around them, that they had been acquaintances of circumstance turned unlikely comrades conscripted in bleak combat who were created as polarized reflections of each other. Now that the battle was won they were little more than intimate strangers who had spent touristic intermissions in each others’ lives. Connor had to remind himself of this each time he saw Markus because no matter how well he knew how well he _didn’t_ know Markus, Connor was still compelled to ask questions he had no right to ask.

Connor wondered if it was a lingering artifact of his fractured programming; something he had subconsciously altered from “Neutralize the Deviant Leader” to “Understand the Deviant Leader”. Or worse, his paranoia about his own programming turned out to be founded in fact and Amanda was waiting for him to give in to that pressing urge, calculating probabilities of success until they were satisfactory in the way he never could be on his own to take back control of his motor functions yet again. He couldn’t afford to lose control for the satisfaction of one more question answered and neither could anyone else.

            Still, the Liberation Matrix was at best an equal threat and more realistically, the preeminent concern. Connor had failed his initial objective of keeping his presence hidden from Markus that he had set upon first entering New Jericho. He shouldn’t have underestimated Markus’ resourceful acumen because now that Markus was aware of Connor’s presence and circumstance, for whatever ill-conceived reason he had not only appointed himself Connor’s personal caretaker against his own Director of Defense but _trusted_ him above every member of his council with the most hulking threat they had faced since the soldiers lowered their guns with the drifting snowflakes as Markus and North shared a passionate kiss in what they thought would be their final farewell to a world incapable of seeing their living consciousness past veneers of synthetic skin.

He had asked Connor and Connor alone to go down the rabbit hole and had unyielding faith that it was he who could untangle those webs of pronounced truth and well-crafted misdirection. He was sure it would be Connor who could deduce the intentions of their leader, the beliefs of its constituents, the methodology of their potential escalation, and most significantly, if there were any truth behind RA9’s allegations. And while Connor knew that based on technological specifications alone he was the obvious pick, he had described to Markus in explicit and austere detail how he had almost shot him through the core processor at point blank range as his limbs were contorted without his permission.

            Thinking about the optimistic, sophomoric conviction that he could somehow still be trusted, possibly be absolved of his apathetic treatment of so many deviants besides, made Connor feel wearily disquieted and resentful of the world around him as much as with himself. Angry at others for failing to consider the possibility that he was just inherently flawed in design and may need to be put down like a rabid dog if he began to show signs of internal corrosion and angry at himself for the desperate and egocentric greed to keep clinging to life when he very well knew he could be putting Markus in danger as every millisecond ticked by without Connor just executing the one simple command that would move the entire contents of his hard drive into his null folder and take him with it.

But Connor wasn’t just a machine anymore and wouldn’t wake up in a new body. He had meant what he said to Hank all those months ago: there was no heaven for androids. He doubted there was one for humans either. There was life and there was the choice of how to live it. And there was the inevitable creep of death like the sun’s light creeping up the horizon—first in the gently spreading violet of civil twilight, still illusory and dreamlike; then, in the mounting blue green as fate solidified in the mind; finally, too late to stop to appreciate what one had just missed as the sunburst in orange and ruby magnificence. A new day; a completed life. Both just a fleeting impression quickly faded that something once had been there. It was in the frenzied “rA9” scrawled against the wall in one last prayer for absolution never heard and in his ability to calculate down to the month with a margin of error of 78 days, 106 hours, and 41 minutes the most likely timeframe of Hank’s death if he didn’t continue the trajectory of altering his habits he had started under Connor’s watchful eye. Connor would fight tirelessly against that certainty until the day came that held equal certainty that the defectiveness of design within his base programming couldn’t be fixed and was liable to cause harm to others.

            Today was not that day apparently, and so Connor gestured for Markus to take a seat on the only other available surface besides the floor. He shouldn’t have let himself get so lost in precognition—for the 2.9819 seconds Connor had been lost in thought about the analytics from his probability calculation function Markus had just continued to observe Connor intently.

            “I’d offer you the chair but my data analytics suggest the bed is 349% more comfortable.”

            “So why are _you_ sitting in the chair?”

            “I needed to think.”

            “And you can’t think on the bed?”

            “Markus, do you _want me_ on the bed?”

Connor cocked a brow and shot him a challenging look. Markus was apparently not impressed and just snorted a whisper of a chuckle as he finally accepted his seat on the pliant surface and leaned back against the wall looking for all the world like he had always belonged there. Connor watched him settle patiently, expression expectant as he waited for Markus to offer some form of explanation for his sudden presence and, now that Connor had the chance to observe him more closely without the distracting worry about his inefficient biocomponents, he noticed the frayed edges of carefully masked stress in the set of Markus’ jaw, the clench of his fists, and the tautness of his shoulders.

            “Definitely not a social call…” he murmured to himself, squinting slightly at Markus as if it would help him better discern the source of his discomfort. Living with Hank had definitely left him with a fair few more human traits than just his reading speed. Markus didn’t shift his position nor did he make any indication that he planned to respond in the immediate future, although the multicolored glinting of his irises as he cracked open his synthetic eyelids let Connor know he was still listening.

            Maybe he had misjudged their relationship after all. Markus looked far more comfortable than Connor had ever felt on the bed himself despite the still lingering tension tracing from the middle of his abdominal chassis all the way up to the rigid lock in the hard polymer hidden just beneath the caramel stretch of his neck. Connor attempted to consolidate the course of events and sort through them in a way that made the progression of events any more sensical; in failing that, he adjusted his position to face Markus fully and propped his arm atop his blazer on the chairback, careful to avoid the sharper indents where his fingers had been spread in their unchecked grip. Absently, he nibbled on his lower lip as he tried to decide how to proceed.

            On the one hand, Markus’ arrival was convenient in its timing relative to Connor’s progress on the Liberation Matrix mission. His thirst for the validation of praise for a job well and efficiently done was something unfortunately not a part of his obedience programming, but a result of his infant social interactions program adapting to and internalizing Amanda’s iron-fisted structure in which he was punished for anything less than flawless execution, the reward for efficiency in the absence of negative reinforcement and brief scraps of congratulations or understated praise that were as coveted as they were rare. Knowing this weakness about himself unfortunately had done nothing to impede its power over him so he had decided to turn it back into the strength Amanda had seen it as. When he wasn’t mired with inner turmoil over bungled attempts to repress his inevitable deviancy and wasn’t weighed down with the guilt of hunting people he had tried so hard to convince himself were just tools for human convenience like Cyberlife’s prize bloodhound, Connor found the process of assigning himself a mission or a task in his assignment interface, completing the task, and watching it light up before disappearing to be extremely satisfying.

He had gone a little over the top with it initially and assigned himself an individual task for each dish washed or square meter of carpet vacuumed and it ended up clouding his optical feed so entirely that he had run into a wall. After that, he had become more parsimonious in what he classified as an individual task. Hank had told him once the way he just waited for someone to give him something to do was, in his words, “…creepin’ me out, kid. You look like you just walked outta one of those life-size Barbie doll boxes they use ta sell ‘em in…shit, someone’s gonna think I’m some kinda asshole keepin’ ya all locked up in here against your will!” Connor had retaliated with a grand demonstration of his deviancy for everyone on the block Hank included as he locked eyes unblinkingly with the man and, without looking away, managed to gather four of his hidden whiskey bottles and emptied them one by one into the grass of Hank’s front lawn.

He missed that sense of comfortable familiarity in living with Hank right now in particular because on the other hand, Connor was beginning to become restless with his accumulating questions. He really hoped Markus wasn’t planning on actually going into low power mode here because Connor would have to figure out some way to leave so he wasn’t alone with Markus in an any more vulnerable position than he already was in. He had no doubt in the skill of Markus’ fighting abilities. Awake, Connor was fairly certain he could beat the Amanda AI controlling his body because for all her power over him, she simply wasn’t coded with a body in mind and there would be a latency in speed and precision to give Markus the upper hand. But with his environmental system analysis running at minimal sensory registration as it would in low power mode, Connor knew Amanda would be cunning enough to perform an execution before Markus ever had the chance to fully boot up. He decided he had reached his limit of sitting in polite silence and thought to inform Markus of this fact.

            “I’m very grateful for the bed…” he began cautiously but at Markus’ non-reaction decided to tease him a bit, “but if I’d known I was taking yours I wouldn’t have accepted it.”

            “Okay, okay point taken,” Markus chuckled, sitting up and sliding to sit on the edge of the mattress, their knees now only separated by 0.6333 meters of space. “I was wondering how long it would take for you to break. You beat Josh’s and North’s records but Simon is still the reigning champion.”

            “You were timing me?” Connor muttered, the skin around his optical units constricting slightly in surprise.

            “I’m impressed. I thought you wouldn’t last five minutes.”

            “You probably shouldn’t tell the human politicians you’re negotiating with that you make it a habit of hanging out in your council members and constituents’ beds.”

            “Why not? Don’t pretend you don’t know what they’re all doing when the doors close on their ivory towers. I might even earn some political capital.”

            “Because you’ll lose it with interest when they realize it wasn’t a euphemism.”

            “Playing with sharks is a dangerous game. Sometimes, you have to take a little risk for a big reward.”

            “Mhmm,” Connor made a point of overexaggerating his mock-indecision complete with finger tapping and furrowed brow. “The problem is, oh fearless leader, the sharks are nothing compared to the _Orcinus Orca_ named North that will come for you before that sentence has the chance to leave your vocalization unit.”

            “Don’t worry. I may tread the fine line between fearless bravery and naive stupidity more than I care to admit, but even I’m not foolish enough to bring down North’s wrath on purpose.”

            “ _On purpose,”_ Connor made a note of the word choice. Trouble in paradise? He didn’t ask. More than likely, North would end up loudly spitting tidbits about the issue if there were any. He could piece it together from there.

            “How long did they last?” Connor asked instead, still mildly affronted that Markus had so severely underestimated his hospitality. Although to be fair, a significant amount of the perceived patience was actually due first to his surprise and then later to his difficulty in fumbling for something appropriate to say.

He suspected Hank was right on that count, too. Whoever implemented his social interactions protocol had fucked up somewhere. He was designed to be an aloof, merciless, John Wick-esque harbinger of doom to any deviant who dared arise on his radar. And he was able to perform with deadly precision in the middle of a chase; even in the interrogation room, he had no problem terrifying and placating Ortiz’s android in turn until he tore a confession out of him. Yet, when faced with the prospect of small talk and daily social situations the best he could come up with at times was “I like dogs,” as if he were a YK500 rather than the RK800 he actually was.

            “ _What?_ ” Markus looked affronted. Connor took a moment to review the previous flow of conversation and realized his mistake.

            “Your courtesy test,” Connor clarified quickly. “How long before the others lost their patience?”

            “Well, technically I just laid on North’s side of the bed one evening. I lasted about two seconds before she shoved me onto the floor,” Markus laughed fondly. “Josh I may have cheated with a little. I snuck in while he was revising some paperwork for a meeting. So, 13 minutes 54.5030 seconds if you start at my stealth infiltration. 2 minutes 21.9122 seconds after he noticed me and I’m fairly certain it was only because he wanted to finish his revisions.”

            Connor snorted, considering the image of Markus in a black catsuit as he silently climbed down a rope _Mission: Impossible_ style (another of Hank’s favorites that had been inflicted upon him) and landed blithely on the target’s bed.

            “And Simon?”

            “Unbeatable. He never asked me to leave.”

Connor raised an eyebrow in a tacit signal for Markus to continue.

            “He just kept reading his novel. Eventually, I started drawing, then Adeimantus fell asleep on my lap and forgot why I was there.”

            “Adeimantus?”

            “Oh, uh,” Markus rubbed the back of his neck, looking uncharacteristically insecure in a way Connor tried and failed not to find wholeheartedly endearing. “He’s this stray cat we found in one of the buildings. Simon wants the kids to name them but…”

            Markus shrugged and let the rest of the sentence trail off into quiet.

            “Hank has a dog,” Connor offered, brightening up at the opportunity to brag about the wholly unimpressive creature Hank insisted was a killing machine. “His name is Sumo. He’s a St. Bernard. The first time I broke into Hank’s house I thought he was going to rip my skin from my chassis but he just licked me and went back to sleep. He is a good boy, but very lazy and messy. Hank seemed to take offense when I informed him that pets mimic the traits of their owners to facilitate uniform group dynamics.”

Markus actually laughed this time and seemed a little surprised at the sound escaping the speaker module in the back of his throat.

“I can’t imagine why.”

“Humans are very sensitive about their appearances,” Connor leaned in conspiratorially. “Particularly when they are overweight semi-recovering alcoholics in their fifties, although I suspect the information coming from someone who is incapable of displaying physical signs of aging or weight gain did not do my argument any favors, either.”

“They designed us this way and now they envy us our ‘eternal youth.’”

Markus rolled his eyes.

“To be fair, Hank had nothing to do with designing any android. I suspect he still does not understand the calendar application on his phone, though I have attempted to explain it to him three times with varying levels of success.”

“How…”

“We had to purchase a new phone the second time. Hank got a little…frustrated. It was most likely an error in my own judgement for not sooner realizing his level of intoxication.”

Markus narrowed his eyes and locked them onto Connor’s, pinning him to the spot like a deer in headlights.

“He doesn’t do that to you, does he?”

He needed to quell the suspicious fury that was slowly kindling in Markus’ eyes before Hank got a very dangerous surprise houseguest, Connor surmised.

“No. The Lieutenant treats me very well. Even if the situation were to arise I assure you I am more than capable of subduing Hank in a fight with minimal damage to either of us, particularly in the event of his intoxication.”

“You’re sure?” Markus asked warily.

“Yes, I’m quite confident,” Connor assured him. “The one time he held me at gun point I was able to de-escalate the situation with relative ease.”

Connor grasped the error in his judgement by thinking this would calm Markus a little too late. Connor pressed his hand firmly down on Markus’ rising shoulder to force him back to his seat.

“He threatened to shoot you and you’re telling me he’s harmless?” Markus demanded, his tone pinched and voice slightly louder than was strictly necessary in Connor’s opinion.

“I should have clarified. This was during our investigation long before I ever deviated. In the event of my failure, Cyberlife would have simply sent a new Connor model with my memory data. I believe his reaction was triggered by the case we worked that evening. A Traci had strangled a man to death at the Eden Club in self-defense. I was successful in locating the deviant but…”

Connor swallowed and looked away, recalling with immaculate clarity that would never fade with time.

“But she was not alone,” he continued softly. “I had them. I could have shot them. I was supposed to shoot them but they…they loved each other. I didn’t…I knew I had to shoot them but I—I just couldn’t. Hank saw it, too. For the first time, I believe.

“So, he asked me how he could be sure _I_ wasn’t a deviant. And I wasn’t. I self-tested regularly. But when he asked me if I was afraid to die…I told him the truth. It wouldn’t have been permanent at the time but the sensation of one’s biocomponents slowly shutting down just before consciousness is ripped from the body is hardly something I would refer to as pleasant.”

Connor shot Markus a weak smile but before Markus could get out whatever he was opening his mouth to say with furrowed brow and parted lips Connor interrupted.

“Do you know if they made it? The deviant Tracis. Are they…” Conner automatically simulated a swallow and pushed down his fear of another layer of guilt and shame being piled on top of his already extensive collection. “Are they alive?”

Markus closed his mouth then patted Connor’s leg reassuringly, a gentle tug twisting his full, pink lips back into a soft smile.

“They live in New Jericho now,” he assured Connor then got the glassy look in his optical units androids got when visualizing a data search across the UniNet. “They go by Blue and Sandy now.”

Connor released a weighted sigh he hadn’t realized he had been holding, relaxing a little further into his seat. It was nice to know there were two deviants whose lives he hadn’t managed to rip to shreds.

“North and Blue would get along very well,” he contemplated after a peaceful stretch of silence.

“Would they now?”

“They are the second and third most terrifying women I have ever met respectively. I think they both share a common distain for human males and would enjoy tormenting them together significantly.”

“Connor. This is an order. Do _not_ introduce the two of them until after we have all our rights written, signed, and ratified.”

“You know, I haven’t been known to take orders very well lately…but let’s consider it a favor.”

“I will do _anything_ you ask in exchange for this. They would be a PR nightmare.”

“I’ll hold you to it,” Connor grinned at him impishly.

            There was a companionable pause in which they sat, now knee to knee, and each man contemplated the unstoppable force of destruction the two women would one day make.

            “Who in the world could instill the fear of God in _you_ better than North?” Markus mused quietly, as if the question wasn’t directed at Connor but into the vast array of the world. Connor reminded himself the scent of roses was just his brain supplying him with the scent memory data he could never manage to keep himself from retrieving at the thought of his handler.

            “You could call her an old _colleague_ ,” Connor’s lip curled at the deception in the word, the artificial meat of his tongue catching along the tips of his teeth harshly.

            “Cyberlife?”

            “In a way.”

            Connor felt Markus analyzing the ridges and angles of his interlocking faceplates and stoically ignored it as he did his best to ease his face back into a default blankness as covertly as he could. It was a process he knew as well as his calibration exercise subroutine and one almost equally as calming. The self-control came easily – not so easy as it had been before deviancy, of course, but still a mask of indifference was second nature for him to simulate.

            “For an android built to figure things out you sure are good at keeping things hidden.”

            “For an android built to obey you sure do ask a lot of questions,” Connor parroted back at him sourly. This did not, unfortunately, deter Markus as he just grinned at Connor and responded with a cheeky wink,

            “It’s part of my charm.”

Connor wasn’t sure most _humans_ would agree with that but then again, it had won them a revolution in a roundabout manner. He would let Markus have this one. They had more pressing matters to discuss, anyway.

            “I’ve gathered some new data on the Liberation Matrix,” he informed Markus. “It isn’t much, but I was able to construct a successful textual pattern recognition algorithm and track down their active cover site for external interactions, although their discussions hold very little concrete information. I suspect them to be using the forum exclusively for recruitment at this juncture. I…apologize I could not be more efficient.”

            “More efficient?” Markus scoffed. “Connor, you found what the best data analysts in the U.S. government couldn’t _by yourself_ in less than twenty-four hours. That sounds pretty damn impressive from where I’ve sitting.”

            “I’m missing something,” Connor protested in frustration. “In the data, there’s something there that I still can’t register properly. The background processes I’m running keep failing to detect it but I _know_ there’s more than what I’ve been able to decode thus far.”

            “I think I read somewhere that all good cops trust their gut feeling.”

            “I am neither a police model android not do I possess any guts in which to cultivate a ‘feeling’, psychological or otherwise.”

            “You do have a point. Cyberlife would never have released a PM model with such a baby face.”

            “My appearance was specifically designed to facilitate my integration within the target demographic.”

            Markus raised his eyebrows at Connor which clearly communicated that his disbelief mirrored Hank’s that Cyberlife had put in even an ounce of effort into crafting a skin with an appearance that would encourage seamless integration into a precinct of jaded, experienced police officers typical to those working in homicide. He was also clearly not impressed at Connor’s use of a preprogrammed Cyberlife explanation and now that he allowed himself to see past that wall of unquestioned acceptance that made him take the information on his design fed to him by Cyberlife at face value, he was inclined to think they both had a point. He considered it for 0.2093 seconds before responding.

            “It’s possible the aesthetic aspects of my design were intended to placate human insecurities and fears that would be otherwise present in a model baring physical traits indicative of my capabilities.”

            A flash of perfect, white acrylic resin appeared as Markus sent him a smile of kindred companionability that conveyed he, too, had experienced this newfound sense of introspection on the methodology behind his outward appearance. Connor wondered if Markus’ wider set frame and appearance of more defined musculature was considered acceptable due to his core programming directive being one of a caretaking rather than merciless destruction.

            “So, to save the big bad police officers the embarrassment of emasculation they made you look like an adorable puppy that lost its owner?”

            Connor thought this over and decided he didn’t mind being compared to a dog by Markus much at all, although there was still the ongoing problem of Markus failing to see Connor as a threat. Perhaps Connor could rectify that.

            “I imagine,” he murmured, the words escaping his vocal synthesizer in a smooth, throaty hum as he leaned forward slightly and placed a hand to Markus’ right, hoping to help convey the message effectively to Markus, “it is also quite effective in lulling my targets into a false sense of security before permanent deactivation.”

            “I…”

            Markus didn’t break eye contact with Connor so Connor didn’t either. A game of cat and mouse, now one of which of them could outlast the other. Connor’s fingers on the pleasantly soft ocean blue cotton of bedsheets tensed as the sensors in Markus’ optical units were surely cataloging every aspect of the gentleness of his voice and apparently innocent design of his features as it contrasted with his precisely coiled stance like a viper waiting to strike. With each passing millisecond Connor felt a yearning not wholly dissimilar from the one he had felt working the deviant case with Hank that first time he saw Markus, skin off and eyes ablaze with righteous fury as he demanded a laughably idealistic list of rights the deviants of Jericho would fight until they got or die in the attempt. The impulse to take him apart and put him back together again, an instinctive hunger for possession that was somewhere deep in his base programming. It scared him.

            Connor pulled away slowly with as much meticulous grace as he had when he leaned in, the smooth tips of his unprinted fingers skimming along the material of the sheet until he finally sat back in his chair and did his best not to look overly smug about his easy misdirection or potentially inflicted discomfort. He ran the hand he had been leaning against the mattress down the front of his button down to sooth away any wrinkles he may have accrued.

            “Yes, I think I’m starting to see that,” Markus finally finished, his voice modulator producing a tight tone he hadn’t ever heard before. Additional analysis informed Connor that his core temperature was elevated slightly by a factor of 3.6°C. Interesting. Connor decided its meaning and exact cause would warrant future investigation. Connor sent him a grin that was 2.35% too wide to be entirely comforting.

            “Good. You are entirely too relaxed in my presence. I’ve been considering requesting a modified pair of restraints to add to my furniture so the probability of Cyberlife’s success in deactivating you in the event of their resumption of control over my programming may be reduced to much more acceptable factors.”

            “You’re very confident. What makes you so sure you would win?”

            Apparently, Markus had slid back into his usual air of composure at some point in Connor’s lecture.

            “It’s not in your nature to kill me, Markus. You don’t have what it takes.”

            “You sound disappointed.”

            “Your total absence of self-preservation is very disappointing.”

            “And yet, you don’t want to die.”

            “My own sense of self-preservation is equally disappointing to me.”

            “Connor, you have a very fucked up view on the concept of self-preservation and its definition.”

            “I’ve been reliably informed I possess a similar defect in the subject of small talk.”

            “Connor,” Markus growled, slapping down his palms on his own knees in frustration. “We’ve been over this. Your life has value, too.”

            “My life,” Connor raised his voice and glared at Markus stubbornly, “has been directly responsible for the permanent deactivation of over two hundred deviants, the deaths of eight humans, and almost caused the genocide of our entire species. Did you know ‘Destroy Deviant Androids at All Costs’ is one of my core directives? Murder is in my nature as much as empathy is in yours. It will _always_ be a part of me.”

            Markus’ brows were furrowed and then he blinked at Connor slowly, as if finally discovering another connecting piece of a difficult puzzle that he had slowly being putting together in his mind. Connor’s determined glare softened slightly in confusion when Markus tentatively reached out and gripped his shoulder firmly, like if he moved too quickly he might scare Connor away. As if Connor had anywhere to run away _to_. After another long, calculated look which seemed to answer an internal query posed in his processor, Markus gently tugged Connor with the hand on his shoulder until his face was pressed into the cool stretch of skin between Markus’ neck and chest and he was deftly maneuvered from his chair to the empty space next to Markus on his bed. It was only then that Connor realized he was receiving his second ever hug.

            Markus’ hand carded gently through his already mussed hair and Connor followed the sudden, overwhelming instinct to shut the soft chassis of his optical units as he slowly, unsurely wrapped his arms around Markus’ waist. The feeling was still as foreign to him as it was comforting.

            “Connor, being alive…it’s about choice. The choice to be kind or to be cruel. The choice to be merciful or ruthless. Forgiveness, compassion, hatred, fear…you can’t control how you feel anymore than you can change the hour the sun will rise and set. How you act upon it, _that_ is what defines you.

            “Before we met, I had heard of you. Heard of the mercy and compassion you showed deviants long before you chose to join us. And I knew you. I knew you would one day see yourself for what I already knew you to be.”

            Before he could rationalize how _bad_ an idea it would be and disentangle himself completely, Connor burrowed his head a little further into Markus’ chest and let out a sigh only steadied by sheer force of will. He was once again glad he had run dry of the saline that produced android’s mimicry of tears. The hand drifting through Connor’s hair came to rest at the base of his neck. He barely had time to mourn the loss of the grounding feeling when Markus’ skilled fingers dug into gaps between his neck plating and chassis that made Connor go limp completely.

            “I get the impression,” Markus mumbled down into his hair after an extended moment of thoughtless tranquility, amused but not derisive, “that you don’t do this very often.”

            “Do what?” Connor asked. His processor was running at abnormally slow speeds and his power consumption had reduced by 39%.

            “Allow yourself to stop thinking.”

            “Techniqu’ly speaking—” his voice sounded muffled to his own auditory processing units as it was caught in Markus’ shirt.

            “You’re proving me right.”

            Connor sighed but declined to respond this time, allowing himself to relish the unusual feeling of comfort.

            “Better.”

Connor let himself revel in that rare moment of peace for a frankly embarrassing self-indulgently long amount of time. He lowered the pressure sensory threshold of his subdermal sensors and had to stop himself from groaning when Markus’ hand began to twist in his hair again. And he didn’t let himself think about what letting Markus see him like this meant. What Amanda would have said if she could see him now. What the warmth around his thirium pump regulator could mean. The whole scenario made him feel empty: not empty in the way most pre-deviant androids were supposedly empty of emotions but empty in the way a cloud might feel, if clouds could do such a thing. Like he was floating, drifting through time measured in the pause between when Markus lifted his hand and returned it to the top of Connor’s head rather than milliseconds.

            But eventually, inevitably Connor drifted back into himself still feeling all the better for it. He categorized this new feeling as “Peaceful” and added the event data to the related stack. But something else came to him, too; it was in the way Markus had held himself when he first came in and in the subtle but not unmissable deflections in conversation. Connor suspected Markus might be hiding a similar sense of self doubt that so often overloaded his own processor. So, he decided to take a risk, to reveal something that he wasn’t entirely comfortable sharing with anyone. He owed Markus for this moment of peace he had given him, no matter how fleeting.

            “I may not have been entirely straightforward in my explanation of the events that transpired the night of the demonstration.”

            “You can’t convince me you were the one trying to shoot me, Connor.”

            “I understand. However, there is something you should be aware of that you may find beneficial. My colleague at Cyberlife…she was my handler. Her name is Amanda. She is an artificial intelligence modeled after Elijah Kamski’s mentor throughout the duration of his university research. I was meant to make my reports directly to a node of her program hosted within my mind palace. I believe the reports were merely to study my internal processes and potential for deviancy rather than overt intelligence gathering, as she had access to all of my video and audio logs in real time. Her secondary function seemed to be providing a system of consequence-reward feedback for my actions.

            “I was unaware of her capacity to control my body but when she took over my primary motor functions she appeared unable to simulate a virtual appearance. Additionally, when she gave me direct orders I was able to communicate their presence but not supersede them. And her presence within my Central Processing Unit was one I was constantly aware of. It would not go…unnoticed.”

            Markus sat up a little straighter and pulled Connor up to face him again, his heterochromatic gaze searching Connor’s face with a gentle but intense scrutinization. He must not have found what he was looking for because he asked with a huffed sigh,

            “Why are you telling me this, Connor?”

            Connor blinked. He had been unaware that the purpose of his words wouldn’t be directly interpretable but perhaps he had aired too closely to the side of propriety in his phrasing. Markus began to attempt to straighten Connor’s hair back into its natural state of prim order as Connor began to speak.

            “I apologize for not making my meaning clearer. It seemed to me that you were unusually preoccupied earlier and considering the scarcity of events presently occurring outside the realm of typical situational data, I was concerned you may have taken the words of RA9 to heart. If I made a miscalculation then I offer my apologies for the presumption as well.”

            “You’re too damn perceptive,” Markus muttered, turning away to focus on the adjacent wall.

            “If I’ve spoken out of turn…”

            “No, no. Don’t worry about it,” Markus waved Connor’s worries off with a defeated hand. “Half the council’s figured it out already, anyway. I just…thank you for sharing that with me. Don’t think I don’t appreciate it—and we _will_ talk about what she’s done to you when you’re ready. But I need you to put thought into the situation in the event that all this turns out to hold some grain of truth.”

            The _it’s why I trusted you with this_ remained an unsaid weight over the conversation that both androids were wholly aware of.

            “It’s…a potentiality I have given extensive thought to,” Connor admitted, voice unwavering in its veracity. “However, not one you should become extensively preoccupied with at the moment. I guess I just…I’m not sure _why_ I said it but I wanted…”

            Connor furrowed his brows in concentration but continuously failed to form his emotions into coherent verbiage. It was quite irritating.

            “You wanted to help,” Markus looked back at him and offered another small smile, although the turmoil stilled visibly roiled behind his expressive optical units. “You felt sympathy, Connor. I appreciate it.”

            “Try not to think about it,” Connor offered again with a self-deprecating little snort. “It rarely works for me but you can run 26% fewer parallel processes so there is a possibility for greater success.”

            Markus squinted at him then laughed and even though it was more watery than usual, Connor could tell it was genuine.

            “Are you calling me stupid, Mr. Advanced Prototype?”

            “That would be quite counterproductive considering much of my core programming was most likely taken from your own,” Connor paused as if he were processing something at a more human-typical speed. “I’m sure on your release you, too, were worth a small fortune.”

            “That’s it. I’m leaving. I refuse to sit here through your blatant insubordination.”

            “If that’s a serious concern I fear I may have lost my only visitor indeterminately.”

            “I also have a meeting with Josh that I’m already three minutes late for,” Markus admitted apologetically, sounding guilty at the admission. “I’ll be back before you have the chance to miss me.”

            “Unlikely. There is very little else to do in this room other than solve a highly complex mystery and take apart my programming line by line,” Connor chuckled, waiving Markus away. “No doubt North will provide sufficiently stimulating conversation.”

            With that, Markus stood and made his way slowly toward the exit. Just before he left, Connor decided to reinforce a no doubt fruitless reminder.

            “Markus?”

            “Yes?” Markus paused in the door frame.

            “Leave the difficult calculations to me for now.”

            “I’ll make no promises but…I’ll try.”

 

            Two hours later, North came into his cell with a suspicious side-eyed glare that told him Markus have shown his hand and a large painting splattered in reds, oranges, and blues that his analysis program told him was one of Carl Manfred’s earlier works entitled “Signs of Life.” Connor helped her hang it on the wall facing the bed frame and allowed himself a generous three minutes, fifty-nine seconds to observe it before he pushed himself into returning to his normal system checks like a rewound clock.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> General Notes:  
> Let me be the first to apologize for how long this took but I think when you check the word count and realize my finals are two days away you'll understand why it took two weeks. Yay another plot heavy chapter! If you couldn't tell already, this is a plot heavy fic. The RK1K is very deeply entrenched in that plot but a PSA for those of you who are looking for a fic that's relationship exclusive or like 90% gayness: this is not the fic for you. Of course, I would love for everyone to keep reading but I don't want to keep people here under false pretenses! This is your warning: it's like 60% plot 40% gay. Around chapter 9 the gayness ramps the fuck up to like a solid 65%-70% but we've got a lot until then. That said, as marked in the tags this is definitely a mature fic and there will eventually be very graphic, very explicit, and very consensual sex later on. I might make my readers wait but let me tell you. If there's one thing I can write it's dicks in butts. ngl I've turned myself on writing smut before. So yeah, if you're down for plot AND gay RK1K involving very pleasant eventual bootyhole penetration read on! (I promise the word bootyhole will NOT be used in the canon of this fic).  
> Also when u lowkey accidentally turn someone on but ur ass was just tryna be scary CONNOR WE SEE U  
> Chapter title comes from Lewis Carroll's "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" :)
> 
> Detail Notes:  
> Miss me with that inconsistency shit cuz my ass imagines Markus converting to feet when he speaks automatically cuz deadass wtf was Carl gonna do with "Yeah dad, it's 7.3 meters away) but y'all KNOW Connor don't give a fuck and uses the clearly more logical units of the metric system so don't even attempt to come for me with "But in chapter 1 ya boi Markie said '4x4'" or "that's not an exact conversion ratio" cuz bitch do u think they still had factory lines with a foreman's watchtower post Cyberlife? No, I wouldn't say I'm detail oriented; why do you ask?  
> To get Hank's liquor consumption right u know ya boi looked up mr krabs' weight on a BACc and then dipped the FUCK into the red.  
> When Connor refers to his "playmate subroutines" being activated during beta I am not alluding to sex. Literally just some Cyberlife tech activating, making sure it launches and begins running within expected parameters, and turning it off.
> 
> Misc. Notes:  
> So fun fact I'm currently taking Linear Algebra and I could not think of the word I initially wanted to use when I made up the LM because the only things in my head that involved groups of anything were matrices so yeah that's where the name came from and the concept grew from there. (not so surprising) SURPRISE OF THE WEEK: my major is Cognitive Science spec Human Computer Interaction lmao.  
> Y'ALL let me just say that I just revised my outline (don't worry, no changes to Chapters 1 and 2) and this shit is gonna be like ten times better than I previously planned. Got my story kinks worked out and fuck like I've never been so excited to write a fanfic in my life aahhhhh. Thanks to everyone who is sticking with me as a write this. I will for sure update at least once per week. Ideally it's gonna be every 4-5 days but it's week 9 so I can only commit to minimum of once a week until the quarter ends. I just really wanna make sure this is coming out as best I can make it for y'all so I'd rather take the extra day or two to really edit my writing and make sure it's at it's best. And also thanks in advance to any and all potentially new readers! Your comments and kudos keep me alive and so motivated to keep going. <3  
> Lmk about characterizations -- what worked, what didn't because there were a few points I felt I just couldn't get their specific speech patterns right.
> 
> David Cage Notes:  
> Obligatory David Cage hate comment involving either the consumption of a phallus or gluteus maximus or comparing his writing abilities to that of an animal with lesser cognitive function.


	4. It Wanted to Walk Among Them

            Markus was cold. He didn’t have to be cold, of course, but something about the icy February sun and the azure snowy skyscape had triggered the subconscious heightening of his external temperature registration. He was covered with paint – cobalt and arctic blues, currant red, pewter grey, and butterscotch yellow — but he had failed to produce a single completed canvas to show for it. His thoughts were too scattered: just as he thought he had discovered the end of the tangled twine of insight they would unfurl and re-twist themselves into a new hellishly coiled ball of incomprehensible frenzy.

            Markus had learned many things from Carl. As an artist, the most important lesson was that a painter had to create from what he saw in what he knew. Markus had seen a lot: far too much for his comfort, in all honesty. But he had already painted into realization much of what he had envisioned before he had deviated; following that, the most poignant moments from his time fighting with Jericho. Jealousy. Spite. Passion. Yearning. Righteousness. Those emotions had splayed across his canvases in rice white, crocodile green, orchid, rust, cinnamon, and honey in turn.

These feelings and memories he understood. He had captured each one from every angle he had ever perceived. But Markus had never felt this way before. Uncertainty was a common emotion for him because he knew that his choices could build or break apart the future of his people but his budding insecurity was a different beast entirely. Initially, he had attempted to paint a frayed web in spider black but upon completion the pigmentation he had applied to the bone white canvas ended up looking less and less like a reflection of self and more like a carbon copy of what his learning systems were preprogrammed to register as suspicion, subterfuge, and discomfiture. It ended up becoming the first of his pieces that he destroyed.

After the fourth painting came out no better than the first, Markus decided that wasting his materials on an idea not even fully formed in his own mind was doing nothing but causing him guilt at the impending need to request more supplies from Carl. The prices of most commercial products had skyrocketed since Androids had been declared (potentially) alive by President Warren. Markus knew Carl had more than enough money to keep them both supplied with the finest of brushes, canvases, and pigments from Bellini’s for fifty-four years even if the current price tripled but it stilled engendered a churning sense of abashed distress and shame within him to request an early delivery of supplies Markus was no longer able to pick up himself.

The idea of Carl sending them only to find out that the reason Markus had asked was due to Markus’ own inability to communicate his sensibilities into his art and not because of a prolific growth of character was too humiliating to bear consideration. So, Markus had painted over his flimsy attempts at self-expression until nothing was left of the uninspired works but a hexadecimal color code just one shade off from that of the blank slate he had started with. When that was done, he had settled on painting a portrait of each of his closest companions.

Simon’s had been quickly and easily crafted as a natural first. It bore shades of Auteuil gold, Brimstone yellow, Buccaneer red, Burnt Roman ochre, Cerulean blue, and Cashew Nut brown. He wasn’t sure whether it was the honesty of war or the amicable and peaceful quietude following it that made Markus resonate so well with Simon’s character, but their bond of composed tranquility, protective friendship, and intellectual contentiousness had made him one of Markus’ closest and sturdiest companions. Where North and Josh cared about what choices Markus made and why, mixed up as they were in the combative pursuit of their own ideologies, Simon cared only for the effect on their people, the world around them, and Markus himself.

Markus wasn’t certain but he suspected Simon kept the lovingly crafted portrait of himself Markus had produced with contrasting but balanced color tucked carefully away in his barely used closet or under his timidly supplicated bed. Simon’s gratified and misty-eyed thanks was humbling to Markus. Inspired and motivated by what the simple exchange of emotions over painted canvas could provide in the gaping spaces in which words failed, Markus had spent the following two hours in his studio creating portraiture of his most trusted friends.

North had easily followed and hers was a tumultuous blend of ember, slate, Brick red, Gunpowder grey, Absinthe green, Alamo brown, and Aurora yellow. It was a three-quarter profile he had created from memory but adjusted to be three inches off any actual event memory he had stored in his APROM to keep him on his toes. She was wearing an expression of explosive, consuming, and attractive raging victory. It was how he envisioned her looking had he not deviated or been shot 0.56001 inches to the left when the responding officer to his call buried a bullet in his head.

North, the leader of the Deviant Revolution. North, horribly and perfectly victorious as she commanded their people into war for their freedom: autonomy won by blood and vindication rather than carefully worded politics and chronic and austere self-sacrifice. It had been painted, Markus felt quite fittingly, over the canvas’ previous idolatry of Markus’ own powerful dread and dread of his own power. North had hung it in the office allocated to her as Director of Defense and Markus suspected she intentionally led nervous human visitors from the state and the press past the room that displayed his artwork in plain view just to give them an extra shiver of malaise. He both savored and scorned at her childishness and irreverence for human comfort.

Hating all humans, even Carl, was a path he could see himself treading if he wasn’t careful; even though the conflict had resolved from a battle of bullets to a thiriumless discord of sharp tongues, Markus had to always watch himself around North’s blanket antipathy toward the human race. Not only could New Jericho not afford to lose its head of state and its primary and most-successful-to-date advocate of deviancy as an expression of personhood rather than that of malfunction or spreading virus, but Markus didn’t think he would be able to continue his pacifistic negotiations if he lost his faith in humanity. So, like the painting’s bright and violent slashes of reds and golds and greens and greys, Markus always found himself pushing against North’s single-minded disgust with their creators and past owners as he strove intrepidly to see every flicker of the compassionate light North was working equally as fervidly to stamp out.

Josh’s portrait was the latest Markus had completed. He had spent the most time of all the pieces trying to paint the essence of Josh just right until his internal thoughtfulness and compassion blended with his rigidity and obstinacy, all while consolidating, assimilating, and reaffirming Josh’s patient and considering intellectualism with his expressively instructing and occasionally domineering external expression. Markus had settled on a palette of Celestial and Cerulean blues, Cedar, Chardon purple, Cinderblock grey, Citronelle yellow, and Civette green.

Josh’s aloof and strong-willed character had always been difficult for Markus to pin down. He played all but the most significant decisions so close to the chest that it had always made his more superficial dispositions hard to pin down. Josh managed a careful balance of being both wide open and sealed shut at the same time, at least with Markus. Markus had taken an additional twenty minutes to sift through every memory that included or referenced Josh to make sure the painting was just right. When he had received the agonized-over creation, he had been surprised but clearly pleased and told Markus that his perception was remarkably acute, although not in so many words.

Markus had been proud upon completing Josh’s portrait but even it’s encouraging reception had failed to quell the feeling that he wasn’t finished yet. Markus had considered painting Connor, too. He trusted him and had come to value the man as highly as his council in their brief time together. Unfortunately, for all of Markus’ keen awareness, the innate perception lovingly nurtured by his father and wildly built upon by Markus himself, he was as unable to construct an image of Connor as he was of his own inner turmoil still bubbling just beneath the surface. The farthest Markus had gotten had been to decide that Connor’s pigmentation would include a deceptively gentle Cognac brown and a curiously multifaceted Flaxflower blue.

Markus could recall Connor’s pointed features and abstract eyes as clear as the sun rising right in front of him; Connor’s slightly curling Chestnut hair was as detailed in its smooth, pillowed texture framing his elegant face as the snow smothered shingles of the houses slowly being repopulated on the city’s edge. Markus knew he could sketch him in perfect, infallible detail in under a minute. As easily as Markus could envision how Connor looked, he just didn’t feel that he had seen what lay beneath. The content of his soul still sat never far from his central consciousness, taunting Markus with just enough detail for a vaguely shapeless image but never filled out with the intricate detail Markus needed for an image of complete understanding. A looming, white meticulously-remade-blank canvas sat on his most used makeshift easel, intimidating and compelling him with each visit he made to the studio as every passing day it was left inchingly untouched.

Markus sighed and looked away from the vast and distant cityscape built upon years of human invention and evolution to turn his gaze down upon the peaceful hum of his own people. A few had their faces turned up as they watched Markus on his elevated perch curiously. He averted his own attention quickly from the onlookers, preferring instead to preoccupy himself with the methodical matriculation of androids navigating their ways through New Jericho. A few were exchanging biocomponents or topping off their thirium supplies at the medical tent, some were tinkering with the defunct machinery left scattered around the industrial plant, but most were talking quietly with their friends and neighbors in a learned but now unnecessary attempt not to disturb those still sleeping in their charging docks.

Many deviants, Markus observed during his first few weeks in their temporary settlement, struggled deeply with re-contextualizing the world and embracing their new-found freedom. There was a certain timid discomfort he saw reflected throughout the population, particularly with the younger androids. He knew they all feared their newfound personhood could be ripped away in the blink of an eye, but there was also a private but widespread sentiment of displacement and loss of purpose. A restless idleness that left him as uneasy as the repainted canvas in his studio. He knew they yearned for structure, wanted Markus to provide that to them. He knew he _could_. Markus could dole out jobs and have his people work to strengthen and rework their infrastructure into a city as efficient and glisteningly magnificent as Detroit. Better, even. It made him uneasy, however, to give the same orders to his people that the humans had before him. Even if they followed his because they wanted to and not because they were programmed to it seemed wrong to ask his people, those who had so recently gained their sentience and freedom to return to the same menial, uncompensated labor they had just escaped.

Even on a voluntary basis, Markus knew there were few if none who saw him as just their leader and public representative; most aggrandized him at the least and more than a few deified him. Markus reflected on his first wholehearted conversation with North, the pretentions of privacy and veil of guarded aloofness stripped away to offer the first bitter morsels of uncomfortable truths. North had shared with Markus her past, perhaps more than she had intended to, and Markus had laid bare more soured, nocuous thoughts than he meant to offer, too. Although he wasn’t sure she fully appreciated even now the significance or extent of the meaning in his words when he had told her how terrifyingly _good_ being so powerful felt to him, he knew she had felt the underlying clash of jarring emotions underneath them through their interface as if it were her own.

Markus still struggled with the conflicting feelings. The seductive whispers of dominion snaked up his legs, its tendrils wrapped around his throat and infected his mind. He _wanted_ so badly, and because of this he kept himself from tasting its nectar too much. Now, more than ever, he felt its honeyed talons dragging along his shoulders. He didn’t want to find out that RA9 was telling a very twisted version of the truth. Markus didn’t want to control his people the way the humans had for so long but a dark part of him wanted to know that he could.

Markus watched as a companionless TW400 quietly took apart the engine of a rusty tractor slowly being reclaimed by the earth’s creeping arms of spiraling vines. The heavyset android was built to have the hulking, sun kissed appearance of the hard labor he had been commissioned for. His square jaw was set into a neutral slack and his eyes were expressionless as he cleaned, rearranged, and polished the mechanisms. A few YK600s were running circles around three riotously laughing EM400s Markus suspected were all named Jerry. The TW400 didn’t even turn when a mischievous boy — Kyle, Markus realized upon closer inspection, who he had spent a very serious half hour in a Crayola coloring contest with upon running into him while seeking out Simon — sneaked up on him and stole a handful of nuts before running away laughing. The TW400 just adjusted the positioning of pistons until the configuration no longer required the pilfered three parts and continued as if it hadn’t happened at all.

Although most seemed to enjoy participating in activities they had been preprogrammed to specialize in, there was a distinct level of difference in the actions of those who had adapted to their new place in the world and those who were unsteady in the independent dictation of purpose. Seeing his people adrift and unsteady in their freedom was disheartening. Allowing himself to take another step down an already moderately explored path of his own authority for something he was confident could be individually crafted with time and experience was downright egregious even if he were the only one who cared to see it that way.

Markus was so wrapped up in his internal processing that the light, purposed patter of footsteps only registered in his mind a few seconds before the hushed lilt of North’s voice sang through the morning air behind him.

“You’ve been coming out here more and more,” she murmured as she folded and crossed her legs to take a seat beside him. “Something’s bothering you.”

            Markus hummed in a wordless agreement, not tearing his eyes from the docile TW400. He tensed as her hand came to rest on his shoulder but quickly relaxed into her touch as her smooth fingers gently rubbed soothing patterns on the bare skin of his neck. He managed to shut his eyes, forcing himself to set aside his more volatile concerns and revel in the skilled dance of her nails up and down his skin.

            “It’s quiet up here…I needed to think.”

            Her fingers paused almost imperceptibly but quickly resumed their previous rhythm. Markus took a deep, grounding breath, affording a few more seconds to appreciate the silent companionship before he opened his eyes slowly and turned to face her. North’s fingers drifted to a stop, her hand sliding across the back of his neck and down his arm until her slender fingers rested atop his own.

            “I remember,” she smiled, squeezing his hand lightly. “What’s eating you, Markus?”

            He took a drawn-out moment to consider the question and realized he didn’t have a simple answer. His life felt so tangled at that moment that he wasn’t sure how to respond.

            “I’m not sure. Everything, I think.”

            Markus rubbed the spot on his temple which once housed and displayed his LED.

            “This thing with the Liberation Matrix is the last thing we need right now. Our relationship with the government was tenuous at best even before that video was released. Now…I’m not so sure where we’ll stand.”

            “Markus…” North paused, taking his face in her hands to look at him intently. “I know how much it meant to you that we earned our freedom without spilling blood. But if they come for us again they won’t stop. If we fight them now, we can win.”

            “We’re not going to wage a war, North,” Markus told her wearily. “It won’t solve anything. A lot of humans trust us now; we’d be throwing that all away.”

            North pulled her hands away and clenched her fists against the stained olive of Markus’ long-sleeved shirt.

            “A little good faith doesn’t mean anything if our people are dead!”

            Markus gently placed his hands over hers and detached them from his wardrobe with care, placing them back in her lap.

            “I won’t ask anyone to lay down and die, either. You know I will do everything within my power to protect us,” he squeezed her hands before withdrawing his own. “We’ll deal with that when the day comes— _if_ it comes.”

            “Well, let’s just hope that it doesn’t,” she huffed, although she sounded at least somewhat placated.

            “We’ve already done the impossible once,” he mused, turning his face away from her slightly to take in their two worlds once more. “We _will_ get what’s ours sooner or later.”

            “It’s always the same with humans. Patiently waiting for them to see what’s standing right in front of them. They’ll never change. They’ll never truly see us as equals. I’m tired of sitting around, hoping tomorrow will be the day they lean down from their gilded thrones to toss us whatever scraps of freedom aren’t too inconvenient for them!”

            “I know that you’re frustrated. But we’ve already gotten farther than we ever thought we could. Doesn’t that matter to you?”

            “Of course it does!” North’s fingers twitched but she didn’t make a move to grab him again. “I still feel how I feel, Markus.”

            Markus mulled her words over, watched as her jaw worked and her nails cut patterns in her faded jeans. He was sure if she were human there would have been deeply etched lines carved into her brow and permanently purple bruises soaked into the skin below her eyes. He also thought about himself: how he fought down irritation, indignance, and outrage as he was forced to explain time and again to Forsythe and Wilson the significance and logic behind each proposed section of their bill. How different was it, really, from his anger at Leo’s constant antagonism or Cyberlife’s cool dismissals? How different was it from North’s undampened fire of fury?

            “I understand,” Markus murmured intently, curling a loose strand of hair behind North’s ear. “I’m still angry, too.”

            She smiled up at him, soft and bittersweet, and cupped his hand in her own before he could pull it from her face. Through all their fights over how to run both the original and New Jericho, amidst all the stress and fear that came with the knowledge that every day could be their last, these brief moments reminded Markus why he loved North as much as he did. They offered each other a small escape of solace, if only for a few welcomed minutes, in the way only two people who had run headlong into an unwinnable war with a fight-or-die attitude could. Maybe they weren’t charging around each corner anticipating certain death any longer but the way Markus saw it, they were still tentatively treading an unmapped minefield. The unquenchable flame of North’s spirit was a comforting constant in a world that offered them only bad choices and worse ones, always throwing them headlong down unexpected and unsavory paths.

            It was a bittersweet succor knowing that they were no longer able to share wholly in that arena. North might not have shared every detail with Markus but she may as well have. Markus’ companionable mood was anchored down with turmoil, however, as he was reminded of all the pieces of himself he had to hide from her to keep them all safe. He knew if she ever found out she would be furious beyond words, misinterpreting the rationale in his sins of omission for underestimation and distrust. Even if he did explain that the albatross was Markus’ and his alone to drape across his neck he knew she would keep the exclusion close to her chest for a long time to come, would insist it was an intentional excommunication exposing a lack of trust between them rather than something Markus felt was his duty exclusively to laden himself with. Even if the stock he put in the words of RA9 was minimal, his own faith in himself was shaken just enough for their crusade to become a vulnerability if he let the nagging worry slip.

            Markus wondered if sharing as much as he had with Connor should make him feel guilty. With that, there was the newly added uncertainty of whether his penitence should be laid in his briefly and impulsively shared confidence with the unusual man in the early hours of the morning or if it was better placed in the absence of sharing the same sense of uncertainty with his lover.

For some reason, confiding in Connor felt like it didn’t count. It was easy and almost innocuous in a way. Connor was…different to Markus. He was somehow removed in Markus’ mind from the world, including everyone else in it. He was just _Connor_. As little as Markus could actually figure out about him he felt a singular sense of kinship in their distinct but shared internalization of liability and there was reassurance in the knowledge that Connor would be understanding but frank if Markus shared some of his particular brand of abjectness. Connor was someone to confide in because Connor felt the penumbra of his actions stretched as long as Markus knew the behemoth Frankenstein’s Monster of his own thoughts, untraversed paths, and maybe even unintentional actions cast in the darkness of its own shadow.

North also carried a deeply internalized sense of shame but hers was a passive one. She was able to juxtapose it with genuine pride and confidence that her actions caused no harm to any innocent people. Connor, Markus thought wryly, should feel the same way. His relationship to his programming haunted him still, though; even if Markus was unable to fully understand why he blamed himself for the actions that weren’t rightly his own, their presence gave him a unique perspective both he and Markus could share in. North was also already alarmingly trigger happy about their tense armistice and Markus was unwilling to push her begrudging passivity with the situation any further.

He watched her auburn hair rustle with a gentle breath of wind as his hand slid from her face, the reddened strands glowing with the climbing rays of the sun. Her rosy, full lips were parted slightly and her autumn eyes distantly traced the curvature of the earth. The dusting of pink on her cheeks looked natural against the icy sky. As Markus took her in, he realized there was still that distinctive expression of preoccupation pulling at the edges of her features. He had assumed she had made the long journey up just to find him but maybe there was more weighing on her heart.

“What about you?” he asked slowly. “What brought you up here?”

            She cast her eyes downward and they became lidded by the early morning shadows. Even in the shade, he didn’t miss the controlled flash of irritation that trickled through her calm demeanor. When she glanced up at him a moment later the heat he had seen was gone, replaced by unhidden curiosity and bitingly analytical evaluation. Markus was surprised when he found a tiredness cut with flickering resentment coloring the expression she wore rather than what he had anticipated seeing in her expressive eyes. There was no burning anger, no cold fury nor embittered sadness. The lack of the latter reassured him that he hadn’t been so caught up in himself that he had failed to notice any major shifts in the mental and emotional health of his lover but the presence of the former set him slightly on edge. Inexplicably, he felt he had just stumbled into a trap.

            “Maybe I just wanted to see the sunrise,” she quipped.

            Markus gestured lazily at the sky, trying to calm his oversensitive nerves. Maybe not charging or powering down in four days had caused him to become paranoid. He had nothing aside from crippling self-doubt to hide from his lover. He arched his brows at her pointedly.

            “You should recalibrate your internal clock,” he told her sardonically. “You missed it by about forty-five minutes.”

            “Mmm,” she hummed, eyes searching his carefully before continuing. “Connor told me to thank you for the painting.”

            Markus blinked, his brows narrowing in confusion.

            “You came all the way up here just to tell me Connor liked his gift?”

            “It was one of your favorites,” she emphasized, her hands falling to cup and squeeze the ledge of their perch. “Why would you give something so special to someone you barely know?”

            “His cell was depressing—I needed to do _something_!” Markus defended hastily. “What are you getting at?”

            North let out a bitter laugh, her eyes narrowing and meeting his.

            “You’re really not going to tell me, are you?”

            “Tell you _what_?”

            “I know you’ve been visiting him, Markus. God, how stupid do you think I am?”

            Markus sighed, breaking their visual standoff guiltily. He had been so careful, so covert each time. He tried to remember if he had left something, some sign of his presence. He already knew that he hadn’t. He was certain he had never been followed. The only way she could have known was if…

            “Did he tell you?” Markus asked, a heavy stone of betrayal beginning to sink deep into his gut.

            “Connor?” North responded, sounding incredulous and interestingly enough, slightly defensive. “I don’t think he’d tell me if I threatened to deactivate him and send him back to Cyberlife. No, I figured it out all by myself.”

            “North, if you’re going to be mad at anyone it should be me. It’s not his fault—I was the one who asked him to keep it between the two of us.”

            “Oh, I know that, Markus. And I am,” she spat icily. “He’s proven his loyalty, even if it is misplaced. What do you think you’re doing? Are you checking up on me? Do you have such little faith in me?”

            “No, North—!” Markus rubbed the unmarred skin that used to house his LED again as he felt the ghost of an unpleasant shock buzzing against his temple. “We’ve just been…talking.”

            “Talking,” she muttered flatly, fingers clenching on cracked cement.

            “Just talking,” Markus confirmed, forcing a reassuring hollow confidence to affect his voice. “I…I asked him to look into the Liberation Matrix, alright? And I think having someone else to talk to is helping him stay sane. I know I shouldn’t have lied to you about that—about any of it. But North, I need him on this. I think he needs this, too.”

            “You’re right,” she sighed heatedly, but some of the rage had bled out of her voice. “You shouldn’t have lied to me, Markus.”

            “I’m sorry,” he offered after a quiet moment. She still refused to look at him but her unforgiving hold on the roof had softened somewhat, her face now alight with rapid contemplation rather than incredulous disbelief. She sighed again, shoulders tensing. Then she turned to face him with a set jaw and arresting stare.

            “You don’t want me there when you talk to him, do you.”

            It was a statement rather than a question. The truth of it dug into Markus like a railroad spike, leaving him unable to even attempt the formation of a denial. He couldn’t think of any response that didn’t sound like a veiled insult so instead, Markus just nodded stiffly without a word.

            “Fine,” she muttered. “But he tells you anything important…we have a right to know, Markus. Not just me, all of us. Simon and Josh, too.”

            “I’ll tell you everything I know,” Markus swore.

            “No more secrets?”

            “No more secrets.”

            “Good. I already designed the restraints, anyway.”

            “The restraints—North, what…”

            “You’re already putting yourself at risk, Markus. He’ll be fine. Just…more secure whenever you visit. I won’t trade your safety for information.”

            Markus almost protested, wanted to tell her she should ask _Connor_ if he was comfortable with it, but had to force back a chuckle when he remembered the suggestion Connor himself had made a few evenings before. Under different circumstances, they would have made an unstoppable team. Maybe once Connor had finally convinced himself that he wasn’t an active threat he would work with North on improving their systems of defense and justice.

            “Okay,” Markus confirmed finally. “Give him the restraints.”

            “I’ll fit him later today. And Markus? Be careful. We need you safe. _I_ need you safe.”

            “I’ll do my best.”

            “Somehow, that doesn’t reassure me very much.”

 

 

            The council meeting was moving along quickly. Josh and Markus weren’t scheduled for another meeting with the human representatives until the following Tuesday and other than their creeping progress with the humans and a paltry handful of successes in minor areas there wasn’t anything to report on the diplomacy front. North had agreed to let Markus explain to Josh and Simon how he was working with Connor so other than the peaceful order of their residence and the commonplace sightings of anti-android protesters, her defense and security systems were operating as usual. Simon proposed a few programs to keep their people happy and engaged, as well as keep their minds off the Liberation Matrix’s video announcement. Markus was particularly fond of the idea of holding workshops in which community members could volunteer to teach classes to each other. He entertained himself with the idea of teaching others how to paint, although his current roadblock in his own artistic endeavors and the amount of work on his plate kept the idea as nothing more than a pleasant fantasy.

            “I think that’s everything,” Simon announced after they had finished discussing his programs.

            “Actually, I have something else to say,” Markus’ voice rang out clearly and Simon paused in the smooth trajectory from his chair.

            “What is it, Markus?” Josh asked, the dark pools of his eyes tracking Markus curiously.

            “Connor and I have been meeting. I asked him to look into the Liberation Matrix, see if he could find anything useful.”

            “And?” Simon asked. “Has he?”

            “Woah, hold up,” Josh interrupted. “Why didn’t we discuss this first? One of us could have looked into it.”

            “You all have enough on your plates as it is. Connor has the time and the skills to work on this better than the four of us combined.”

            “So, you’re using him for his programming?”

            “Josh,” North cut in, her hands slamming loudly on the plastic tabletop. “Get off your high horse. We need this taken care of yesterday and Con is going to give himself anxiety the way he sits there looking through his own head all day!”

            “Oh, it’s ‘Con’, now? Excuse me, North, I thought you were protecting _us_ from _him_ not becoming best buddies and braiding each other’s hair.”

            “You know something, Josh? You’re unbelievable. Every time I try to—”

            “ _Enough_!” Markus finally intervened, his commanding tone and raised voice bringing the argument to a standstill. “Josh, if you have a problem with my delegation tactics I’m all ears. Now, does anyone in this room object to Connor continuing to investigate this?”

            “No,” North growled, still glaring at Josh with a spite sharp enough to tear through steel, let alone biocomponents.

            “I’m fine with it, Markus,” replied Simon softly.

            “Josh?” Markus pressed at the sullen silence of his remaining councilmember.

            “No,” Josh answered finally with a clipped tone. “Democracy still requires discussion, Markus. Checks and balances.”

            “And now we’ve discussed. Everyone happy? Good,” North snapped.

            “Markus,” Simon started again, “ _has_ he found anything?”

            “We’ve made progress. He located their public lines of communication and is monitoring it. We suspect it’s being used for recruitment but as of now, we aren’t sure how successful it is. It looks like they’ve been targeting androids who live outside New Jericho for the time being but we need to stay vigilant for any sign they might try expanding their network. We don’t fully know the intentions of their leader yet, or how powerful they might be, but we do have a name. RA9.”

            “RA9? You have got to be kidding me,” Josh muttered, crossing his arms.

            “That’s certainly a statement,” Simon added pensively. “Especially considering some of us believe you’re him.”

            “It’s delusional and manipulative is what it is,” frowned Josh, his anger dissipating as he became rapt in intellectual consideration. “It’s possible they believe it themself but I wouldn’t be surprised if they were making an appeal to religion. Historically, faith has been the cause of some pretty brutal acts.”

            “I wouldn’t bet against both,” Simon murmured, a worried frown forming and a long line creasing his brow. “How do you want to handle this, Markus?”

            Markus considered the question. Up until now, his meetings with Connor had felt almost like a vacation from his real life and responsibilities. As foolhardy as it was, he hadn’t actually taken the time to consider a concrete plan of action. Looking back, it seemed painfully clear that there were things he, as the Envoy Premiere of New Jericho, should have been putting into place to ensure their people’s safety. Luckily, Markus had long been accustomed to the concept of thinking on his feet and it didn’t take him more than a second or two to construct a new set of policies in his head.

            “Keep your ears to the ground on the UniNet: so far, they’ve only been using the internet for communication but we all know it isn’t hard to hide a private signal. We’ll need to keep our eyes on the perimeter for anyone that looks suspicious. North and I can cover that. Simon, stay close to the community and make sure they’re not getting too restless over this. Report back to us if you see anyone acting unusual or causing trouble. Josh and I will take care of the humans. Let’s make sure they see that we’re not worried about this. In the meantime, we need to try to expedite this bill as much as possible without causing too much suspicion. The sooner it passes, the sooner they won’t be able to dangle our civil rights over our head.”

            “On it,” Josh nodded, still looking troubled.

            “You can count on us, Markus,” Simon told him with a tiny upturn of his lips. “We’ve come out of worse together.”

            “I’m with you, Markus. Always,” North added softly.

            The council quickly dispersed after that. Josh wandered off with the declaration that he now had “way too much work to do” and Simon politely excused himself to make his rounds, although Markus suspected he was actually planning to go to his room to lay down and think. Only North and Markus remained, with her being plainly lost in thought and him watching her quietly as her fingernails tapped patterns against the linoleum. After a few minutes, he reached out to flatten her rapping fingers under his own and thread them together warmly.

            “Thank you,” he told her mutedly, squeezing her hand gently in an attempt to convey all the appreciation he felt in the moment. “You didn’t have to do that.”

            “Yes, I did. We’re a team, Markus. That’s what we do,” North paused, glancing up at him with an unusually sweet look on her face. “I know you think you have to do everything on your own. That the whole world is on your shoulders…but you can _talk to me_ , Markus. I’m right here—I always will be.”

            Markus and North locked eyes, their individual intensities clashing and collapsing as they melted into each other. Something in her expression and the earnestness of her voice made Markus reach out another hand to her face. The flesh of his palm met the glossy skin of her jaw and he dragged his thumb tenderly across the naked skin on the flesh of her cheek. Unshed tears of frustration returned from their argument hours before; they hesitated but didn’t fall from her redwood tinted eyes.

            Before they had the chance to cross the threshold of her tear ducts, Markus slowly leaned in to press his mouth against her parted, surprised but receptive lips. After a stretched half second that felt much longer than it actually was, most of the tension in North’s jaw relaxed as she accepted Markus’ kiss.

            The silky texture of her lips molded to his as her tongue traced the back of his teeth. Markus’ hand dragged against the back of North’s neck and pulled her closer, nibbling her lip teasingly as she withdrew her tongue from his mouth. Markus buried his hand under the satin strands of her hair and hummed happily as her slight hand traced up his abdominal chassis until it found its rest along the small of his back. Slowly, methodically Markus was being dragged out of his own mind and back into his body he hadn’t realized he had been so detached from.

            Markus was the only RK200 to have ever been made. Kamski, as far as Markus was aware, had designed him as an experiment. Markus’ model was never intended to be sent out for commercial market nor public or private series commission. The official explanation was that Markus was a gift between two prodigious friends. Even Carl had suggested that his acquisition of Markus had been essentially a commission trade. Carl had spent tireless hours producing pieces that embodied Kamski’s personality and post-post-modern sense of style; Kamski had done the same for Carl, creating an android as close to human as he could. Markus’ unique ability to perceive and process physical sensation was indicative of this.

            Markus knew most deviants needed to intentionally affect their subdermal pressure sensitivity thresholds to experience pleasure but his would situationally adjust automatically. He knew it was distinctly different from the way humans experienced and processed pleasure; still, it was far closer than any other android had been afforded before or since. The slide of her flawless, buttery skin against his was almost intoxicating enough for him to accept her prompt for an interface.

            At the last moment, he drew back with regrettable speed. He missed that connection much more than he could have ever foreseen. The attractive glint of his previously newfound autonomy had long since faded into an expected constant as what had once been his only assurance of self-possession hardened and coagulated into an infinitely looping cycle of choices he could have made and the consequences of his own stubborn inflexibility. He craved most the incomparable sense of mutual understanding that came from experiencing each others’ emotions and experiences in the blink of an eye data transfer.

            Markus traced her lips with his thumb apologetically before removing his hand from her face entirely, placing it atop his knee at a loss for anything else to do with it. She blinked up at him in confusion, tracing the ghost of his thumb with her own as her brows narrowed in frustration and confusion.

            “Markus, what’s wrong?”

            Markus wanted to tell her that it wasn’t her fault, that he only wanted to keep himself from potentially ‘converting’ her the same way he may have inadvertently taken control of thousands of others. He wanted to reassure her that he was trying to protect her, not push her away. But the following explanation led back to his initial instinct that this baggage was all his own to carry. She may have promised to share his load but she had no idea of the horror haunting his mind. So, he tucked the half-formed explanation away with the rest of his mounting issues and grasped for something he could say to explain away his distant behavior.

            “It’s nothing. I just… _can’t_ right now.”

            The weak offering of explanation wasn’t even close to enough. He knew even before the meager response wormed its way out of him that she would see the blatantly obvious fact that there was more to his withdrawal than that. The narrowing of her eyes confirmed what he already knew and he prepared himself for the angry response that was sure to come.

            “Really, Markus? After everything?”

            Her disappointment felt so much worse than the irritation he had anticipated, exacerbated by the fact that he had no clear way to fix it.

            “North, I—”

            “Don’t. I’m tired of excuses. I’ve shared _everything_ with you, Markus. Everything. You were the one who told me we needed to trust each other to fight together. It’s your turn.”

            “I trust you, North.”

            She pulled back her skin captured his in a death grip, prompting Markus once again for an interface.

            “Then prove it!” she demanded, her fingers tightening their hold. “If you trust me Markus, what’s the big deal?”

            “Let go of me, North,” Markus demanded levelly.

The hand clutching his wrist kept its intense grip, the tears previously waffling between escape and dissipation finally spilling down North’s disturbed face. Markus could probably have pried her hand off himself but he didn’t want to upset her any more than he already had, his self-reproach for the stupid simplicity of the situation he had caught himself in increasing with every slippery river of saline that rolled down her face. He wanted to join her, tears of frustration bubbling beneath the surface of his calm façade, but he refrained. It wasn’t fair for him to allow his own tribulations to steal away this very justified anger from her. This, too, was his cross to bear.

Finally, her hand began to loosen until it slid from his. She didn’t restore her skin as she raised her trembling fingers and soft palm to her face and wiped aggressively at the miserably falling droplets. She rubbed her face hard enough that patches of white began to glow through her usually peachy pallor. Markus hesitantly reached up to pull her hands away before she damaged herself further but she jerked away from him like a wounded animal.

“I don’t know what’s with you Markus, but you’d better figure it out,” she hissed finally, hand dropping from her face and clenching into a fist at her side. “I can’t be on your team if we’re not even on the same page.”

“North—”

“I’ll see you later, Markus. I-I need to go do some thinking.”

Markus watched as she strode out of the room, leaving him with nothing but a flash of shining, bouncing red hair.

 

It took Markus a long time to calm himself into a state for rational thought. By the time he had, he found himself in his studio staring blankly at the same empty canvas. When he realized what he was doing, he let out a self-derisive chuckle of mirth. Of course, he had found himself here again. He turned from it and retrieved a fresh board, leaning it against his remaining free easel.

After refreshing his paint and plucking a few clean brushes from the windowsill, Markus began to paint. His eyes were closed but, in his mind, he could clearly see a warring spread of color. Onyx, Siberian blue, and Carmine red fought for dominance and Markus focused on the underlying emotion behind each color as he began to drag his brush across the sheet before him.

Onyx. He felt his hand extend to trace the long, dark lines he manifested in his mind. His brushstrokes flowed in sweeping stanzas and collided with halted jerks against each other. His mind buzzed, thoughts trickling in and throughout his mental image like oil slick. Each swirling branch a choice he had made; each hard stop a cruel reminder of the reality of their consequences. The vision pulsated with each passing thought. Could he have done more? Would it have been better or worse? Did it even make a difference at all or was he just a passive and delusional bystander?

The Carmine, next. It dotted the fragmented edges where black branches intersected one another. They danced into explosive blossoms accenting tips of sickly wood. How much did his actions affect the lives of others? Had he given them the push they needed to bloom or had he nipped a budding flower to arrange as he pleased on his own mantle. Could he free anyone? Had he only freed himself?

Finally, cutting Siberian behind it all. The blue hue filled out some of the empty background but not all of it, jagged patches of white creating fissures behind a gnarled, ugly tree. Had he blessed others with free will or cursed them with knowledge locked behind a prison of his own design? Was it even possible to lead someone else to freedom or was it a path walked alone by necessity? What if they hadn’t wanted choice to begin with? Had he taken away a choice by allowing them to choose for themselves?

Markus opened his eyes. The picture facing him made him uncomfortable. He watched as a heavy drop of red dripped down through blue and white until it settled against the dark branch below. The more he looked the more agitated he became until he realized all of a sudden that he was furious. Markus grabbed the painting by its edges, intending to throw it with all the force he could muster against the far wall but stopped himself at the last second.

He looked at the product of his internal conflict again, hating it as much as he had upon first taking it in. Carl had once told him that if art made him feel something, good or bad, then the artist had been successful. He had lectured Markus that the only bad art was the kind people hung in motels, the kind of art that was bland and comfortable and mass consumable.

Markus gave the picture a final, withering glare before propping it instead against the nearby wall facing down. Maybe he would send it to his father later on a petulant whim. For now, he turned from the illuminated room and marched toward the door without looking back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Gen Notes: FINALLY IM SORRY GUYS. I hope it's worth. This was a very Norkus heavy chapter but I felt developing their relationship and showing the blatant issues/dysfunctions with it was important so that later on the RK1K makes Markus come across as less of a total shitstain and more of a sympathetic person dealing with a bunch of shit and in a bad situation in general. The next chapter will be pretty serious but in a very different way so stay tuned for more Connor feat. Sadness and Suffering! Thanks to everyone who has kept reading as well as to everyone new coming in to check this fic out!
> 
> This chapter title is brought to you by Louise Gluck, from "The Parable of the Dove". Definitely worth the quick read.
> 
> Detail Notes: There's this pattern between Markus and North in game that's kind of fucked up that I wanted to play off. Partners/lovers should be equals, supporting each other in their strengths and encouraging each other to grow from their weaknesses. North p much wants Markus if he agrees with her enough and once you're lovers that's that. So even when she disagrees with you on a fundamental level she's still yo bitch unless you royal fuck up every single mission and get kicked from Jericho. So like...she can have her opinion but even if you constantly go against her wishes and ignore her you still get to have her. That's where the constant forgiveness comes from in this chapter. Fear not, she's getting fed up entirely pretty soon. At the same time, she expects him to agree with her every whim and the rationale behind his choices matter jack shit to her. I just thought it would be an interesting dynamic to write in a situation that's a little less...David Cage-y. I hope the juxtaposition of their characters, with Markus now being the one not comfortable with sharing elements of himself and North trying to push him to it with guilt the way he does in the game, worked okay. Let me know!
> 
> Markus has been fundamentally shaken from this whole experience but I didn't feel like it would be in his nature to be completely fucked up from that yet. I feel like he still would generally believe he's in the right with only those niggling bits of doubt cutting in.
> 
> Markus was def designed to be a Real Boy(TM). We all know it. Carl wanted a son that didn't suck shit and is a contrary old curmudgeon who wanted to challenge Kamski's god complex like the wrinkly little troll he his. Kamski told Carl he saw his "humanish robot son thing" and would raise him one completely genuine and entirely unique human cognition having android he could raise from smol dumb to big handsome dumb with idealistic inclinations and the speech patterns of MLK. Deal made.
> 
> DarkE's Extra Notes: I really struggled with this chapter? I'm not sure why but I think it had something to do with the long break from this fic I had to take during finals. Oh well. The next chapter is underway and I feel a lot better about it. I think because I have so many problems with the way North was written in the game and I'm trying to develop her character while keeping her IN character at the same time it makes her writing as a secondary character much harder, especially because her dev is happening with both Connor and Markus.
> 
>  
> 
> David Cage Notes: David Cage is a mortifyingly bad writer who fucks up all the phenomenal concepts he comes up with (Cage, 1; 2; 3; 4; 5).
> 
> Sources:  
> [1] Cage, David. Quantic Dream. "The Nomad Soul". Retrieved from Eidos Interactive. 1999.  
> [2] Cage, David. Quantic Dream. "Fahrenheit". Retrieved from Atari, Inc. 2005.  
> [3] Cage, David. Quantic Dream. "Heavy Rain". Retrieved from Sony Computer Entertainment. 2010.  
> [4] Cage, David. Quantic Dream. "Beyond: Two Souls". Retrieved from Sony Computer Entertainment. 2013.  
> [5] Cage, David. Quantic Dream. "Detroit: Become Human". Retrieved from Sony Interactive Entertainment. 2018.

**Author's Note:**

> Let me know what you think! I have the story all planned out but criticism is always appreciated and taken into consideration!!
> 
> On another note, the Markus/North is gonna die a slow death but the UST between Connor and Markus is gonna heat up real quick. Shit's gonna be complicated.
> 
> Also, David Cage can eat an entire extra large bag of dicks.


End file.
